The Beginning of the End
by purefoysgirl
Summary: Start of a story between Cloud and Kadaj, staying as true to the characters as posssible. Cloud finds himself confronted by a boy who is frighteningly similar to a man he once loved and had been forced to kill. CloudxKadaj/RenoxYazoo. PLEASE REVIEW!
1. An Unexpected Visit

It wasn't as if anything had ever changed, after all. Some were gone, some were still near—but the overall story was the same.

He sighed and gazed down at the city he'd fought so hard to protect, at the _world_ he'd fought so hard to protect.

'_Was it worth the cost_?' Such thoughts plagued him, narrowed his glowing blue eyes and tightened his mouth. '_What else could I do_?'

The answer, as always, was nothing. Perhaps it was that very powerlessness that had so drained him these last few years. Powerlessness…and guilt—the only constant companions he had. And while he mourned the dead, the gone, those he had failed, the living slipped further from him. And that, too, was a grief he could not conquer.

"So maudlin," a voice purred, startling him from his dark thoughts. Reflex caused him to turn instantly, sword drawn, eyes narrowing on his target.

A boy was behind him, standing with slim arms crossed over his chest, his weight on one hip so that he looked to be draped where he stood—lazy grace, the same lethargic negligence of a cat. But the sword at his back was no toy and he radiated an eerie danger that belied his youth.

"Who are you? What do you want?" he asked, his voice a hoarse bark. There was something disconcerting about this child, something familiar in the set of his shoulders and the shape of his lowered head.

"Who are _you_? What do _you_ want?" The boy's silver head lifted and he gasped, a vision of sliver grace tearing through his mind's eye.

_Green eyes and hatred, hatred as sharp as the blade he'd wielded so cruelly…_

He bared his teeth and tensed but the boy had not moved, merely smirked, one silver brow arching. He had those same light jade eyes, same manner of staring from the tops of them, head lowered a little. Same arrogance that was as unconscious as it was deserved.

"You disappoint me, Cloud," he purred, letting his arms drop and walking towards him. He flowed over the ground, confident and graceful, hips swinging in a way that would become a swagger in a man. But in this young creature it was as sultry and distracting as the most experienced stripper's strut. Indeed, young and androgynous as he was, there was much of the feminine in him—the long lashes, the round cheeks, the full lips, the studied and lithe movements. This boy was beautiful and, more, he knew it. There was no little vanity reflected in his eyes. But then, that vanity was well-deserved.

"I had thought you would be more…" he trailed off, head cocked to one side, silver hair falling to cover one eye. The other eye gazed at him critically, flicking over the minute details of his person. It took a second to register the insult in that breathy, crooning purr and he stiffened in response, swinging his sword up to pause the slender youth.

"How can you be disappointed in someone you've never met?" he questioned. "Answer me! Who are you?"

The boy shrugged, a wry smile curving his full lips. Those lashes flicked once, twice, drawing attention to his feline eyes. "Does it matter, brother? I'm the same as you—something used and discarded, forgotten."

He smiled again, and this time there was a feral cruelty there.

"But _I_ won't be ignored! _I_ won't let them forget me!"

"What do you want here?" he questioned sharply, alarmed by the sudden turn in the child's mood.

Again his head cocked prettily to one side, his look that of a fascinated cat.

"Why, brother, he wants _you_, of course!"

Cloud took an unsteady step back, the comment like a physical blow to his chest. He didn't have to ask who, there was no mystery here. This boy was a slender, feminine version of a ruthless man he'd once loved beyond all reason—and had twice murdered. Secrets, such secrets he'd kept, eroding him slowly but surely, cutting him off from the innocent and guileless.

The boy shifted fluidly and took a step towards him, checking only briefly when Cloud's blade touched the pale column of his throat. Cat-like, he pressed his cheek to the flat of the blade and, purring, languidly slid alongside it until his small feet framed one of Cloud's own. His look was predatory, amused, teasing.

"He's coming," he whispered, eyes intense and not quite sane in their excitement, the pupils drawn to snake-like slits. Again that head-tilt, fluid and sleek. "What will you do, brother?"

"You're no brother of mine!" Cloud snarled, surging to knock that slender form back. That _offensive _form—offending in its eerie similarity to one who'd perished in madness, offending in its corrupted youth and innocence.

With a short, sharp laugh the boy easily flipped backwards, anticipating his reaction, landing lightly on his feet out of reach. With startling, familiar speed the boy drew his _souba_, holding it in a sure left-handed grip. And that, too, was the echo of a ghost.

"That's more like it!" the youth hissed, grinning with excitement. "I may be no brother of yours, but we both were fashioned in the image of a God!"

"He was no _God_," Cloud bitterly said, lunging, the boy parrying with preternatural speed. "I've _killed_ him."

That achingly familiar child laughed, fending him off with wiry strength, defending but never taking the baited openings. "Does it eat you, brother?" he questioned, his movements snake-like and lithe. "How strong you must be, to murder the one who loves you."

_Those frosty jade eyes, the pale lips parted in silent shock, the expression that plainly begged, 'How could you? How _could_ you?'_

He snarled in anger, driving the slim youth back and back again until the hilts of their weapons caught, trapping them face to face.

"How far did you drive the blade in, brother, before he finally raised his own?" that silky voice asked, eyes wide.

He closed his eyes in a wince, pained. When he opened them they were resolute, cold, but haunted. "He never did," he lowly said, grieved.

"Ah," the boy breathed, admiration on his fine face. "Now I understand what he saw in you, brother."

They broke apart, parrying fiercely.

"A merciless heart to match his own," the youth said, flipping over his head and spinning to face him. "Only you didn't play by the rules."

Clang of metal on metal, the hiss of breath. The boy leaned in, incredibly strong for all his slimness, holding up under Cloud's force.

"You _betrayed_ him," he hissed, sharp teeth flashing. "He would have died before truly hurting you!"

"He _did_ die before hurting me!" Cloud hoarsely ground out, a tear of rage, shame, and frustration beading in the corner of one eye. That familiar pain, sharp and deep—because after the fighting, so intense and brutal, in the end it had been _he_ who had changed the rules. _He_ had been the one to decide and strike true. There had been chance after chance for him to be cut down by _masamune_, but it had not been death Sephiroth had been after. It had been Cloud's loyalty, his heart. And like a true Judas Cloud had done the teacher one better and had delivered him into the arms of every man's constant lover—death.

"Ah," the boy purred, sidestepping and giving him a shove that staggered him. "_This_ is a pain we know well."

He lunged, snarling, sparks striking from the blades. The child twisted, lunged, and pinned the sword between the blades of his own.

They stared at one another, panting, hands gripping the hilts of their swords so tightly their knuckles burned.

"Will you do it again?" the boy asked, silver hair floating around his mouth with every gasping breath.

He scowled, schooling himself to feel nothing, shutting it off from the inside.

"I _will_."

He laughed again, the sound musical and child-like, utterly innocent.

"Oh, brother, don't you understand? He would expect no less from you," he sighed. "And _that_ is why he wants you still…"

Cloud jerked back, dragging the heavy sword out and up, falling back into a guarded stance, but the boy hadn't moved. He stood splay-legged with both hands on the hilt of the _souba_, gazing at him through a spill of silver hair.

"He's dead," Cloud said, the words like ashes in his mouth. The same phrase that had sucked all of the life and meaning from his life. "And that's where he'll stay."

The child chuckled impishly, an unholy sound that skittered down his spine. He wrenched the _souba_ up and darted forward, blades flashing against Cloud's defensive movement.

Cloud spun around, putting his shoulder into that slender hip, knocking the boy into the air and off of his feet.

He twisted, cat-like, and landed on his feet in a crouch. But Cloud was already on him, pinning him against the boulder at his back, the blade held behind him and one corded forearm across the boy's slender throat. He could feel the pulse fluttering against the bare skin below his elbow, thrumming with excitement, the throat frail and tender.

The youth swallowed convulsively but made no move, even his lids were still, heavy over the glowing jade of his eyes. His lips, full and pink as a girl's, were parted slightly, the curve and shape of them achingly familiar—he'd kissed these same lips, only once time and bitterness had stolen their childish plumpness and rendered them cruel and cold.

"He's coming back," that low voice breathed, his warm breath stirring his hair so that the silver strands brushed Cloud's cheek, wispy and soft as cobwebs. He closed his eyes briefly, risking attack, but the memories were strong enough to require a pause. The boy didn't so much as twitch in his grasp, just breathed softly now, the recuperative power of youth. "We will all give up a part of ourselves to resurrect him, and then he will love us all. He will lead us to a place where we aren't hated or used, a place where we aren't _unwanted_…"

He winced, the stigma sending him a sudden, shooting pain. The boy's eyes widened, for a split second they were frightened and utterly lost, so bewildered it tore his heart.

"Do you have it?" Cloud asked, and the youth's eyes narrowed once more, a sneer twisting those full, girlish lips.

"I am _pure_," he spat, offended. "The Sephiroth gene was given to you, but you're human still. My brothers and I are purely _him_—"

"How many of you are there?"

"—It isn't like that, brother—"

"Were you grown as an experiment?"

"We aren't like _you_!" he shouted, bringing their brief battle of words to a close. He sighed a little and sadly, mournfully said, "We are all that's left of him."

Cloud increased the pressure on that delicate throat only slightly, making the boy wince, his right hand fluttering up to rest on Cloud's bicep.

"_Tell me_," Cloud lowly said, shifting to press his hipbone into that slim belly, keeping him pinned—he had a weight advantage against his petite adversary, though he barely topped 5'9" himself and was comprised almost entirely of flat muscle.

The boy lifted his chin, swallowing with difficulty. And yet his pale cheeks did not flush with blood, his jade eyes did not bulge with the pressure on his veins—the miracle at work, alien cells working godhood in a child.

"He was shattered when you destroyed him, brother," the youth said, his voice changing slightly, becoming high and soft as a child's. "He couldn't stay in the Lifestream—she wouldn't have it. You _hurt_ him…you hurt _us_. And she didn't want us, either, we've never belonged here." Those lids lowered over his incredible jade eyes, giving him even more the look of Sephiroth. "You didn't want us, and we loved you so much…" Cloud flinched, seeing the flicker of his older lover reflected in this tender child. "What could we do? There were others made from us, others who were we. We had to hide, we had to _heal_. But they hurt us and hurt us…"

"Shinra," Cloud said, every muscle tensing.

"Ten years of their torture, brother—even longer for my brothers," the boy said.

Cloud frowned, eyes flicking over that soft face, those feline eyes, the softly set mouth. He himself had endured four years at Shinra's "mercy"—it was no wonder this child was mad, ten years in their care.

"I'm sorry for you—"

"I don't need your _pity_!" the boy spat, venomous in his anger.

"You have it," Cloud simply said. "I know what they do. I know what _you_ had to do."

"_Endure_," he breathed, feline eyes closing tightly in a moment of pain. Just as suddenly they popped back open, focusing sharply on Cloud's own blue eyes. A slow, sultry smile curved his plump pink lips and he turned his head a little, silver hair sweeping over Cloud's arm, tickling and soft.

"I could be him for you," he purred, gloved fingers sliding from the top of Cloud's bicep to the underneath, unerringly finding the soft, sensitive skin just below the ribbon tied there.

Cloud nearly came out of his skin it startled him so badly. He drew back, as assaulted by memories as he was by the slender sylph-like creature he kept trapped against the boulder.

Shaken, he stepped back, releasing the boy as he clenched his fingers hard on the hilt of his sword.

The child shook his head, silver hair floating in gossamer strands, that predatory smile still gracing his lips. He looked at Cloud from the tops of his eyes and his stance changed subtly, the curve of his back somehow accentuating the almost feminine curve of his hips.

"You don't need to be my enemy," he sighed, the _souba_ held loosely in his left hand as he lazily advanced on Cloud, slender body moving with snake-like sensuousness. "He wants you more than anything, even still."

"Don't!" he sharply commanded, mesmerized by the slim youth's grace, drawn by his resemblance to one he'd loved so well and deeply. He steadied himself as the boy drew near, ignoring the small, incredibly strong hand that skimmed up his shoulder, tracing the contours of his wolf's-head brooch until it hit the pulse ticking madly in his throat—the only outward sign of his agitation.

The lithe young man flipped the _souba_ around and sheathed it expertly, the movement fluid with practice. He pressed his left hand to Cloud's cheek, the gloved touch cool. It was the touch of his dead lover, but it lacked Sephiroth's possessiveness, his consuming dominance. This one was steel wrapped in silk, yielding and submissive—but only to a point.

"You want him, too, brother," the boy softly said, so close now a breath couldn't stir between them, and still Cloud couldn't bring himself to push the boy away. Small feet framed one of his own and the slim youth fit himself perfectly to Cloud's hip and belly, fingers drifting to his nape, jade eyes wide with stark excitement. So small, even shorter than himself, nowhere near the towering size of Sephiroth.

The youth's head tilted up, sweet breath spilling over his skin. Eye to eye now, Cloud could feel the soft brush of those velvety lips when he whispered, "I could be him for you…"

Cloud checked the small movement he made, unwilling to bend to his memories, his heart—guilt had eaten him, become too much a part of him to so easily dismiss.

The boy laughed, a soft, sultry sound and, tilting his head to the side, leaned up to whisper in Cloud's ear, "Would it be so bad? Reunited with the one you love, made whole again—no more pain, no more being an outcast. And, finally, _love_."

The tongue that touched his lobe was hot and wet, curling to draw his flesh into a skillful mouth. A split second later sharp teeth sank into the meat of it, drawing blood and a sharp hiss from Cloud. He grit his teeth but made no move to stop the boy as he worked and worried his flesh. The stigma clamored, shocking him with pain and, somehow, transferring to that slender youth, who shuddered and worked his teeth higher, opening a gash in Cloud's ear. That tongue darted, lapping at the blood, probing a wound that was already knitting itself back together.

"Mmm…" he sighed, drawing back with a glazed, satiated look on his beautiful face. Dark blood stained his full lips and smeared across one perfect cheek. He was breathing unsteadily, his eyes cloudy and half-lidded. "You taste of us…And you say we aren't brothers?"

The sting in Cloud's ear was already fading as the wound closed. He took a calming breath, trying to control his racing pulse and a deeper, more insistent ache. How long since he'd allowed anyone to touch him? He hadn't felt the draw of violence coupled with sex since he'd last endured Sephiroth's dark, utterly consuming attention. No one had touched him since…having been baptized in such heartless and cruel attention, how could any of them compare? And he'd mourned its loss every single day of his life…

"You're just like him," he said, defending himself now as he'd always had to with Sephiroth, letting a slight, cold smile curve his lips. The boy tensed, brows slamming low. "He was the same as you—when bullying, whining, or fighting didn't work, he'd just seduce to get his way."

The child recoiled as if he'd been slapped, his look one of utter outrage. _Now_ blood flushed those cheeks, a faint tinge of color that wrote his age in emotion across his face. Vain, yes, but easily wounded—a child still, trying desperately to become an adult in a world which held no mercy for him.

"_Whining_?" he spat, eyes huge with shock. "How _dare_ you?"

The blood on his face made him look frighteningly vulnerable—a wounded child, a perfect, battered doll. He backed off, his movements lithe and feline.

"Be sure you've made the right choice, brother," he hissed. "Make sure this time that it's one you can live with!"

In a flash he was gone as if he'd never been. Moments later there was the roar of an engine fading into the distance.

Cloud let the silence envelope him, shoulders slumping a little as the tension drained off. The encounter had left him shaken more than he cared to admit—his hand trembled when he sheathed his sword. The stigma pained him, throbbing beneath his skin. He didn't know what to make of that boy except that he made him uneasy and that this would not be the end of it. Of that he was sure. His lover's words were echoed in the child's, his movements and body mirrored by the boy's. That he'd managed to reach beyond the grave to seek him startled Cloud.

Love may survive Death, but Cloud had never dreamed that it would survive betrayal.


	2. What Must Be Done

"You smell…_strange_."

It was Yazoo who met him when he parked his bike, standing utterly still in the darkness. Moonlight gleamed off of his silver hair and pale skin, his jade eyes softly glowing. He lifted one slim hand languidly and touched the blood on his little brother's face.

"There now," Yazoo sighed, cocking his head, hair pooling over his shoulder. With his free hand he pulled his smaller brother close against him in a warm embrace. "Didn't I warn you, then?"

"He's…he's different than before," Kadaj said, patient while Yazoo licked the blood from his lips, warm tongue washing him and ingesting Mother's cells from their brother's blood, briefly returning Kadaj's sudden, demanding kiss. The littlest one demanded their constant affection, constant proof of their love for him. When he was satisfied with Yazoo's response, he allowed his brother to lave away the last of the blood on his mouth, murmuring, "He's not like we remember…"

"Of course he's not," he was told, his taller brother pulling back to gaze down into his face. Of the three he was more physically a twin to Sephiroth—tall and lithe, his movements languid and graceful. It was Kadaj, the youngest of them, who had internalized their origin—the temper, the determination, the obsessive nature that bordered on madness, the jealous and zealous possessiveness. "We are different, too."

"He'll kill us," Kadaj said, and was saddened by the thought. Deep inside him, in the place where the _other_ slept fitfully, he felt an answering sadness that, after all this time, Cloud was still determined to murder his own soul.

"He will try," Yazoo crooned, stroking his hair, petting him. Yazoo the comforter, the one who'd soothed them when the tests and blades and blood started, when the screaming wouldn't stop, when the _madness_ came. How often had he and Loz woken up in Yazoo's lap while the somber man comforted the horrors away? "So we will kill him first."

Loz appeared then, drawn by the murmur of their voices and the proximity of Kadaj—each of them could sense the others, a constant and comforting presence that let them know they were never alone.

Immediately rankled to see the baby getting attention, the bull-like man pushed his way between Yazoo and Kadaj and snuffled at his little brother.

"Blood?" he rumbled. "But you haven't been fighting, Kadaj."

He licked away the smear of blood on the boy's cheek.

"_Tainted_," he spat, swallowing. He gripped Kadaj's chin and gave him an affectionate smile. "Does he have Mother, _koishii_?"

"I don't know," Kadaj answered, moving between his older brothers and past them. "I didn't ask."

Loz sobbed softly behind him and Yazoo crooned to him, hugging his broad shoulders.

"We'll kill him," Kadaj said, steeling himself. That uninvited guest inside him that had so recently flowered into being raged against the decision, an overpoweringly possessive fury burning Kadaj's soul—_Cloud is mine, how _dare_ you think to harm him_!

"We must," Kadaj whispered in answer to that demand.

His brothers watched him with solemn understanding and nodded their silvery heads.

He held his hands out to them, their little Messiah, and they silently gripped his slender hands, accompanying him back to their camp.


	3. Tifa Tries

Cloud sighed and gently brushed a strand of hair back from Marlene's moist brow before moving to touch the stigma on Denzel's forehead. It was so late it was nearly morning, and the children slept easily in their twin beds, unaware of Cloud watching over them. Though he had essentially moved out, Cloud would still come by in the night to check in his office for notes left by Tifa, or simply to drink in the sight of the two innocent children who loved him so much. There was a purity to them that Cloud wanted to preserve, though he knew it was useless…

"Cloud?"

He straightened, lowering his head. He never could meet Tifa's eyes anymore, couldn't bear the straightforward understanding he always found there. _You have no idea what I hide from you, Tifa…you would hate me if you knew…_

She stood in the doorway of the children's room, her hair loose around her shoulders and her eyes glassy with sleep. She smiled gently at him and looked as if she'd like to hug him, but she knew better than to try.

"It's late," she whispered. "Are you staying?"

Cloud shook his head, stepping back from the children's beds and keeping his head down, bright blue eyes staring blankly at the wall.

"I have to go—"

"_Cloud_!" Tifa sharply said, barring his way, knowing he would not put his hands on her to move her. "Do we disgust you so much?"

"Tifa," Cloud breathed, shaking his head a little, drifting back from her.

"Why did you come here?" she asked, her voice gentle. "They hardly know you anymore…I know I don't."

"I…" Cloud glanced at the wall, trying to get his thoughts in order. Why _had_ he come? He'd been so unsettled by the boy, by the potent memories of Sephiroth…he craved to be near something unspoiled and whole, to see people who loved him without judgment no matter what he had done.

"What do we have to do for you to love us?" Tifa questioned, her eyes liquid in the faint light.

Cloud squeezed his eyes closed, hurting for her. Aerith, at least, had understood him. She had loved him even knowing what he was, even knowing what he'd done, and she'd never asked him for more than he could give. Tifa, he knew instinctively, would not settle for less than all of him, would not suffer the ghost of his lover in his life, and Cloud simply could not release it. Having lost so much already, his memories and guilt were all he had.

"Tifa," he softly sighed, suddenly weary.

She nodded a little, her mouth pursing and her arm dropping loosely to her side.

"You look dead on your feet," she said, deciding to let it go. "Come on, I'll fix you a drink."

Cloud nodded, solemnly following her down the creaking stairs to the bar where Tifa was most at home. He sat on a barstool, his head throbbing and feeling too hot—his thoughts kept skipping back to that boy, worrying at the encounter like a dog with a bone. And each time he felt the sharp sting of teeth in his memory he stifled a hiss, disturbed by how much so little had affected him. He felt more restless than he had in months, the need to be held almost a physical ache.

"Here," Tifa said, sliding a glass over to him and sitting next to him, her chin in her palm. She always looked at him with such open admiration, loving him for things he simply wasn't—beautiful when his heart was so dark, a hero when he truly had performed the ultimate act of destruction, a friend when he pulled so far from them all. Tifa didn't see him at all, she saw a shell with glowing mako eyes and a body toned by trials.

"Do you think you'll ever stop being sad, Cloud?" she asked, watching him spin the drink idly in his strong hands. Sometimes she wanted to shake that glazed lethargy from his eyes, just to see shock on his beautiful face—just to see _something_ besides that closed, cool mask. Softening, she said, "They miss you, Cloud."

"I miss them, too," he murmured, distracted by the jade eyes flashing in his memory, thoughts drawn again and again to the curve of that boy's back, the delicacy of his throat, the plump pink lips that had touched him with a skill that made a mockery of his innocent face.

"Do you miss me?" Tifa teased, yet there was an undercurrent of hurt in her voice.

"Tifa, please," Cloud whispered, tilting his head away from her. "You know that…I need time—"

"Time for what, Cloud?" she demanded, her tone still soft. "Time for Marlene to grow up? Time for Denzel to start hating you because you promised him a family and gave him _this_?"

He winced, but was somehow disturbingly grateful for her words that flared his guilt to a white-hot heat and chased the thoughts of that boy from his head. He cherished the pain, feeling as if he earned it.

"Stop pushing us away, Cloud," Tifa begged, and dared to touch his shoulder, muscle ticking beneath her warm palm.

His head swung around, his glowing blue eyes pinning her and almost _angry_, resenting the gentle touch, resisting any comfort. For a second he held her eyes, and then lowered them to the bar, lips parting softly as he searched for words.

"You're hurting…" she sighed, tugging at him gently. "Come here, Cloud."

He pulled against her, resisting, but Tifa wasn't having it. She knew he wouldn't stoop to actually rejecting her—Cloud preferred to be non-confrontational, preferred that others take their cues from his reactions and treat him as he wanted. But Tifa was ignoring his cues, ignoring the narrowing of his eyes and the tensing of his body, ignoring the way he stiffened in response to the compassion she offered. The last thing Cloud or his guilt wanted was comfort.

She stood and tugged him to her, cradling his head against her chest, pressing his cheek into the pillowy softness of her breasts. He strained away but her strong arms held him fast and he gave in to the comfort she offered, sighing softly. Tifa crooned to him as she did to the children, stroking his wild hair with one arm stretched down his back, idly twining her fingers in the leather of his harness.

"Will you just relax?" she asked, a hint of laughter in her voice as her fingers moved up to massage the base of his neck, continuing her crooning.

Cloud closed his eyes and settled against her, circling her narrow waist with his arms and hugging her close. It was a simple comfort but he'd denied himself any sort of contact, hardly even deigning to hold the children's hands when they accompanied him out. It hurt them, he knew—but it hurt him worse, and that was all that mattered to Cloud.

"Cloud," Tifa crooned, dropping a kiss on the crown of his head. "Stay here tonight?'

He stiffened immediately, tensing to pull away, but Tifa tightened her hold on him, hastily saying, "Just here, at the bar."

"I can't," he hoarsely said, and pressed his face between the softness of her breasts, breathing harshly.

Tifa curved her body to hold him, supporting his slumping weight with the strength that had never failed her or any of the people she cared for.

"Please, Cloud," she breathed, ashamed to be so needy but too true to deny what she felt. And if Cloud could not accept that, then so be it—Tifa certainly wouldn't stop trying. "Can't you just give a little of yourself?"

He knew that emotion, that drowning and consuming sadness to see the one you loved so close, so near, but so utterly withheld. What would he _not_ have done to feel Sephiroth's touch? To hear his voice? To abandon himself to him? How badly had it hurt each time he'd been passed by, unnoticed and unwanted, so utterly rejected it seemed his heart would shatter? Could he continue to do the same thing to Tifa, whom he loved—if only with the habitual, absent love of a childhood friend?

He sighed into her skin, the tension draining out of him.

"Come on," Tifa whispered, sliding her hand down his arm in a way that awoke goosebumps on his skin, but inspired nothing in his libido. She twined her fingers with his and eased him to his feet, gently tugging him up the stairs and to her room.

Cloud mentally dragged his feet, dreading it. Women had always come easily to him when he was young and untried, even moreso after Sephiroth had instilled that darkness in him—they craved to find out what made him tick, to pierce the armor of his coldness and unleash the beast inside him. He'd taken them in anonymous rooms, feeling nothing more than the physical reaction. After Sephiroth's return, after he'd _killed_ him for the second and final time, Cloud couldn't bear another's hands on him. If he couldn't have _that_ then he wanted nothing.

Tifa pulled him down onto her bed and smiled at him shyly, the dark curtain of her hair spilling over her shoulder. She was so beautiful that it made Cloud wonder if more was wrong with him than he thought—surely with so strong and loyal and lovely a woman, he could find the willingness to bond with her?

She leaned into his heat, her hands on his shoulders, and gave him a gentle kiss. She was no novice to the art of love, but Cloud felt nothing. _Nothing_.

"It's okay," she murmured, drawing his hand to her breast so that his palm filled with warm, soft flesh. Her touch on his belly was gentle, seeking. "You won't hurt me, Cloud."

_But I _can_ hurt you, Tifa. I _would_ hurt you. I _need_ to hurt you…_

They kissed again and the stigma bit at him, his mind filling suddenly with memories of Sephiroth and that dark, sweet pleasure.

Cloud gasped, eyes popping open to meet Tifa's. She looked concerned and soft, ready to mother him through anything. But it wasn't those chocolate brown eyes, so deep and dark, that he wanted to see. He wanted pale jade eyes with slit pupils, cold and mesmerizing as a snake's. He wanted cool amusement and harshness coupled with a relentless pursuit of pleasure. He wanted _pain_ and all the myriad pleasures it could bring…

That boy sprang to mind again, the curve of his cheek and his feline eyes, the heat of him through all that leather and the spicy, sweet scent of his skin. The feeling of his teeth ripping up through his skin.

Cloud rose abruptly, feeling his body respond instantly to thoughts of that boy. _That boy_.

"Cloud?" Tifa whispered, hurt and confused, looking up at him where he stood.

"I'm sorry, I have to go," Cloud murmured, shutting her out again, lowering his eyes as he swung away. He heard her soft, sad voice call his name again as he moved out into the hallway, keeping his tread light as he passed the children's open door. He skimmed down the stairs and glanced in his office, spying the picture on his desk. He paused a moment, regarding it—it was taken outside of 7th Heaven when all this first began, Tifa leaning down to embrace Marlene and Denzel, Cloud standing with his arms crossed defensively in the background, aloof from them.

His incredible blue eyes swept shut for a heartbeat before he got it under control. A moment later he moved silently down the stairs and out onto the street.


	4. Kadaj on the Hunt

The baby was restless.

That alone was enough to put Loz on edge, watching Kadaj's slender body drift around their room, his fingers trailing over the items on the bureau and a rather sullen look on his sweet baby face. He was fifteen now, an idea Loz had trouble getting around, though his little brother had sprung up like a weed in the past two years, almost up to his nose now.

"Where's Yazoo?" Kadaj asked, flinging himself down on the bed next to Loz and pillowing his head on the older man's belly. He did it with the utter assurance of a child much-loved—there was nothing in his experience with his brothers that would lead him to believe they could ever do anything but bend to his whims.

"Out, _koishii_," Loz said, his stacked hands beneath his head as he watched the video feed playing near the ceiling. It was the news, and that never failed to bore Kadaj. Loz was not about to tell the little tyrant that Yazoo was roaming the streets of this bustling town without him. Kadaj was, if anything, insanely possessive of his brothers. Loz had never forgotten what Kadaj had done to Yazoo's first lover—he still wore her spicy-sweet perfume just to amuse himself at Yazoo's expense.

"Tsk," baby said, petulance in his voice. He rolled onto his belly, legs dangling over the side of the bed, pressing his cheek to Loz's hard belly and tracing lazy circles up the man's ribs. The inn was far more comfortable than their camp, and Kadaj was glad he'd decided to pause there before the next plan of action. He knew Cloud came here pretty regularly for deliveries, and felt a pull to see him again. He flicked his eyes up to Loz but the man paid him no mind. "Are you going out tonight?"

"Maybe," Loz said, giving him a grin. "Why, Kadaj? _Jealous_?"

Kadaj smirked and spitefully dug his fingers into Loz's skin, breathing, "You're _my_ brothers, Loz. What pathetic human could hold a candle to _me_?"

Loz chuckled, amused by him.

Kadaj changed tactics, slipping up to straddle his older brother and block the video feed.

"Don't you love me, Loz?" he asked sweetly, pulling a pretty pout.

"Of course, _koishii_, who wouldn't love you?" Loz laughed, letting the boy snuggle onto his chest and kiss him.

"Do you love me _best_?" Kadaj questioned.

"Yes, I love you best, Kadaj," Loz rumbled, and gave him a sloppy kiss before slapping his bottom with no little force. "Now go play, _koishii_, and leave your big brother be. You may be pretty as a girl, Kadaj, but you're far too complicated for your loyal Loz."

Kadaj smirked and sat up, satisfied. He sought out Loz less than Yazoo because the bigger man was so terribly devoted to him. It was Yazoo who worried Kadaj, Yazoo of the distant eyes and secretive smile, who always claimed love but always seemed so reserved. So Kadaj demanded it, time and again, demanded the devotion of Yazoo's body and the assurance of love made flesh.

"Well, this is dull," Kadaj sighed, hefting his body lightly up and swinging around to fall into the nearby chair. He felt a restless pull from the sliver of Sephiroth inside him, an insistent ache to find Cloud that sharpened into something that was almost pain. He wondered what drove it, this spirit inside him…but then Cloud had a portion of Sephiroth, too. Perhaps the spirit knew something Kadaj did not.

"I'm going out," Kadaj announced, rising to strap the _souba_ to his back. "I'll come back when I come back."

"Be careful, _koishii_," Loz said, looking at him with his pale jade eyes.

Kadaj gave him a sultry smirk over his shoulder and asked, "What fun would _that_ be?"

Loz laughed, watching the baby move recklessly off on his own.

"Little tyrant," he said affectionately, and, after the news finished, went out to find some excitement for himself.


	5. Reno Meets the Girl of His Dreams

**A/N: Thought I'd keep a chain of events going here, so this is what was happening while Kadaj was on the hunt. Poor, poor Reno, how we love that little rascal…Hope you enjoy, this is proving to be a longer story than I'd first thought.**

* * *

Reno stumbled into the dark, smoky bar, the throbbing music hitting him like a wave.

His bright blue eyes scanned the room, none too focused as he made his wobbling, unsteady way to the bar.

"Hey, Reno, you look like you've already had a long night," the bartender observed, prepping his usual.

"Just having some fun, yo," Reno said, his voice even, though his steps were not. He knocked back the drink and tossed his credit card down on the bar.

"Gonna be _that_ kind of a night?" the bartender asked, brows up.

Reno grinned, one brow up and one eye closed.

"Might be needin' that room, yo," he said, swallowing down another and motioning for more.

"Well, you certainly aren't driving all the way back to Edge in your condition," he was told, another drink set before him. The bartender slid him a key, saying, "It'll go on your tab, second door on the left."

"As usual," Reno drawled, lighting a cigarette and peering around the bar, leaning on it to keep from falling. He was feeling dizzy and light, in the mood for some company.

"Anybody here tonight?" he asked, taking his drink a little slower this time, alternating swallows with drags from his smoke.

The bartender grinned and moved off to fill other glasses, leaving Reno to peruse his options on his own.

He glanced down the bar and caught a glimpse of pale, luxurious hair and delicate, doll-like features. He shook his head, shaggy red hair flying in all directions, trying to focus his blurry gaze on what he was sure was a goddess sitting by herself.

"_Fuck_, I'm _drunk_, yo!" he informed the returning bartender, who merely smiled and refilled his empty glass.

"And get that pretty kitten down there another of whatever she's having," Reno said, gesturing vaguely with his glass past the crowd of bodies.

The bartender scanned the bar quizzically, asking faintly, "Which kitten, there, honey? The brunette at the end? She doesn't seem your type, Reno…"

"No! The _blond_, yo!" Reno laughed, rolling his eyes.

Again the bartender looked down the bar, his eyes landing on the object of Reno's attention with no little perplexity. Shrugging, he filled the drink and moved down the bar with it.

Not feeling particularly patient, utterly confident in his unfailing skills with the fairer sex, Reno moved negligently down to the empty barstool beside his goddess with drink and smoke in hand. She was a knock-out, he could tell just by the glimpse he got of her slender back and curved hips, a sheaf of that pale hair hanging down her back.

"What's up, yo?" he asked, sitting down next to her and leaning companionably on the bar, just waiting for her to turn and look at him and decide she wanted a piece of Reno—that was pretty much the way of things. He tried to check her out some more but she was leaning on the bar, too, her pale hair falling in a shimmering stream over her shoulders. Her profile was sculpted and delicate, patrician, her pale pink lips kissable and full.

"What, no thank you for the drink, baby?" Reno chided, his easy, relaxed manner not standing on formality. It wasn't often he met a woman with the fortitude to resist him—continuous success had made him understandably arrogant, and an inherent, foolish charm endeared him to even the coldest of women.

She turned her head slightly, giving him his first full look at her face, and his mouth dropped open just a bit in shock at how beautiful she was. She fixed him with intense, feline jade eyes surrounded by lush lashes, her mouth relaxed into a soft, natural pout, the corners of her lips curled up slightly at the ends like a cat's.

"Fuck, you're gorgeous, yo!" Reno said, grinning at his good luck.

She gave him a cool, assessing look, her lids half-lowered, her sculpted face as neutral as a mannequin's. She had a small, kittenish nose and a mouth to kill over, lips pale pink and full.

"I didn't ask you for a drink," she said, her voice a husky, throaty purr that moved over his spine like velvet.

Reno laughed, shrugging his slim shoulders, utterly struck by her haughty beauty.

Her pale green eyes narrowed, not amused, the bar's blue light painting her light hair an unearthly hue.

Reno finished his drink and gestured for another, stubbing his smoke out and trying to get a better look at her where she sat. She was slender, obviously in good shape, but the way she held herself kept her arms in cahoots with her hair so that he couldn't size up her rack—still, judging from the rest of her he was pretty positive she'd be stacked.

"What's your name, yo?" he asked, watching her sip her drink. Her hands were as slender and delicate as the rest of her, long-fingered and deft, the column of her throat working smoothly as she swallowed. The sight of it made _Reno_ swallow, a crooked grin on his lean face.

"So…" he slowly said, edging closer, asking again, "What's your name?"

"You _are_ persistent," she purred, looking at him again with those sultry, cool eyes, her face so perfect it would make an angel blush in shame, yo. He voiced this thought aloud and she arched one silvery brow at him, looking ever-so-slightly amused, but not particularly impressed.

"I'm Reno," he offered, hooking a thumb at his chest and giving her a cocky smile.

"Fascinating," she said, sounding bored, and carefully put her drink down.

Reno downed his drink and stood unsteadily, searching his pockets for his smokes and his lighter. He got one in his mouth and managed to light it, taking a deep drag. Unfortunately, he slipped off the stool when he tried to sit and wound up on his knees below the bar.

Laughing, he heaved himself up and caught her watching him, sparkling amusement in her eyes and a smile on her face that made him catch his breath, answering her smile with a dopey one of his own.

"You are an idiot," she told him, giving him a hand up.

"Yo, you are one beautiful creature, baby," Reno said, sitting next to her with his arm pressed to hers. "I wanna do bad things to you."

"And _you_ are _drunk_," she said with a delicate wrinkle of her kittenish nose. "You smell like a distillery."

Reno grinned at her, determined to have her eating out of his palm…or his lap, whichever.

"You've got a really low voice for a woman," Reno said. "It's fuckin' _hot_, yo!"

"I _do_ have a low voice," she agreed, giving him an enigmatic smirk that seemed far too amused, adding, "For a _woman_."

Reno saw their glasses sitting empty and gestured the bartender for another round, giving the man a wink which he answered with a stifled laugh.

"You pack heavy, baby," Reno said, nodding at the gun holstered at her back over her lush hip.

"It's a dangerous world," she murmured, eyes shuttered as she sipped her drink, her movements delicate and precise.

"Little girls like you need a strong man around to keep them safe, yo," Reno informed her, causing her to choke a little on her drink, laughing.

The look she gave him was disbelieving, exasperated, as was the startled laugh. "Are you truly this obtuse?" she asked, as if he was playing a joke and had taken it too far.

"What's that mean, yo?"

She laughed again, tilting her head back briefly and sighing before looking at him with the beginnings of true interest.

"You gotta let me get you in the sack," Reno said, shaking his head, enamored and not missing the spark of interest in her eyes—they were warming up, her face softening under the sheer force of his easy charm. "You won't regret it, baby."

"Well, at least _one_ of us wouldn't," she said, and Reno skipped the faint confusion her statement caused, preferring instead to stare at her lips and wonder what they'd feel like on his skin.

He gave her a look that usually had panties hitting the floor in seconds and said, "I got a room here, let's go, yo."

She tilted her head and then gave him her own version of his killer look—Reno swallowed convulsively, suddenly too hot and staring fixedly at the pink tongue she slid over her pink lips. He jumped a little when her hand slid into his lap and over his crotch, but couldn't tear his eyes off her face, even when she gave his cock a brief squeeze and purred, "I'm not sure you could handle me."

Quick as that the look was gone and her warm little hand was back on her drink like nothing had happened.

It took a second for Reno to shift the fog off his brain and yank it out of his groin, but when he did he breathlessly laughed, "Baby, I could handle anything to get my hands on a broad like _you_."

"And what would you do with me when you had me besides _bad things_. You're _too_ drunk," she pointedly said, arching that perfect eyebrow at him, adding, "_And_ you're an idiot."

Reno chuckled, impervious to insults, and leaned into her, saying, "Oh _that_ don't matter to me, baby—the longer I drink, the longer it stays up, yo!"

She gave him a skeptical glance, close enough that he could've kissed her, but then she purred, "We'll see about that."

Grinning at his victory, Reno smoothed his hand down to grip her thigh, lean and long and warm beneath her leather coat, though the way it was zipped prevented him from letting his fingers wander between her legs. She liked leather, yo—he _loved_ freaky chicks!

That thought slipped out and she laughed again, her sultry eyes holding his and her soft mouth curving when she murmured, "So freaky you probably can't stand it." She smiled at him again, genuinely intrigued, and said, "You certainly are an amusing oaf."

"S'all part of my charm, yo," he said, downing his drink and stubbing out his spent smoke. He made a mental note to slow down a bit but it didn't really register. "Don't worry, kitten, I'll get you purring."

"Dare to dream," she said, tilting her head to one side. "So what do you do besides pick up strangers in bars, Reno?"

He liked the way she purred his name, rolling it off of her lips like a piece of candy.

"Oh, this and that," he said. "I work for a company as an enforcer—I'm a grade-A, certified ass-kicker!"

He punctuated that statement with another inglorious tumble from the bar, causing her to outright laugh in abandon and help him to his feet, giggling, "Grade-A, certified _ass_, maybe."

Reno managed to get back on his stool and got an arm around her slim waist, leaning close into her amused, perfect face.

"I'm the best lay around, yo," he told her, proud of himself.

"I certainly hope so," she lightly said. "I hate wasting my time."

"Lemme have a taste of that pretty mouth," Reno murmured, and curled his tongue out in a way that never failed to draw appreciative giggles and a playful, shy kiss.

She quirked her eyebrows, parted those perfect lips, and sucked his tongue into her mouth.

It surprised him even more than her bold touch had earlier. He wasn't too used to girls being aggressive and, frankly, he couldn't have been more pleased. She kissed like she looked—perfect, and he cupped her skull in his palm, leaning into her. She bore up under his weight like a pro, her tilted head offering him the fullness of her hot, wet mouth. He felt himself scorched all the way down to his toes, his balls tightening and a swift bolt of need jolting his groin when he thought of her slowly snaking tongue on lower, harder places.

He broke the kiss, a little breathless, amazed to find her looking at him with that same steady, cool amusement. Her face truly was flawless, the face of a carved goddess, her light hair a soft frame that complimented the beautiful curves of her patrician bone-structure.

He swallowed hard, pulse pounding in his temples, his throat, and his cock. It wasn't often that Reno got startled, but he tended to go towards vapid, giggly creatures who were content to let him take control—this woman was a goddamned _knockout_.

Her lids lowered, giving her the perfect, withheld look of a sphinx.

"I wanna cum on your face," Reno breathed, the thought popping into his head and out of his mouth before he could stop it.

She smiled at him and murmured, "Delicious…"

Reno made a strangled little squeak, eyes wide, and she laughed that throaty, purring laugh.

He gave her a crooked grin and asked, "Wanna go, yo?"

She laughed again and he felt a sudden pressing need. He grabbed her hand and said with a hint of urgency, "I'm going to do very bad things to you, and that _is_ a promise!"

Even though he was unsteady he was still nimble and quick, tugging her away from the bar and through the pressing crowd to the stairway. He was dizzy and far too drunk, the world swimming around him and the feel of her cool, slender fingers in his enough to leave him panting. He paused at the door to unlock it swiftly, telling her, "I'm gonna have you screamin', yo—guaranteed."

"I give it ten minutes," she said. "And _you'll _probably be the one screaming."

He dragged her into the darkened room and locked the door, on her in an instant. He noticed that she was tall—maybe even a little taller than himself—but didn't give a shit. He held her face in his hands and kissed her until he was gasping, feeling her trembling breath against his lips when they parted.

"This isn't a game," she breathed, and suddenly said, "Reno, there's something I have to tell you—"

"Later, baby, I'm busy," he told her, intent on sucking the soft skin of her neck, his hands frantically working to undo the holster of her gun.

"But, Reno, I'm not—"

"Open your mouth again and I'll put my cock in it, no kidding, yo," he swore, finally freeing the holster and tossing it onto a nearby chair. "Get those pretty hands on me, baby."

"Play the game," she murmured, smiling, and wrenched his jacket off of him with force enough to sway him.

"That's more like it!" he said, letting her strip his coat and shirt off of him, his eyes adjusting to the darkness so that he could see her intent look, her parted lips. "Holy fuck, yo, you're the hottest goddamned girl I've ever fucked."

"Shut up, idiot," she fondly said, her swift hands expertly unbuckling his belt and yanking open his pants. Teasingly, she said, "Open your mouth again and I'll put my cock in it. _No kidding_."

He laughed at the joke, feeling her cool fingers wrap around his cock and give it a squeeze that had him on his toes gasping for breath and mercy and more all at once. And then she was on her knees, her perfect pink lips wrapping smoothly around the head, her tongue curling to tease the sensitive tip just beneath, one hand making an almost too-tight circle at the base and the other hand sliding into his pants to cup his balls.

"Oh fuck," Reno groaned, not steady enough to trust himself standing and wishing like mad for more light so he could see that exquisite face of hers with his cock in her mouth. She gave him a hard suck and dropped her lips down to meet her fingers—no gagging, just the right amount of teeth, a delicious hard suction as she ever-so-slowly moved back up.

His breath came out in a trembling rush and he threaded one hand in her soft, silky hair, thrusting a little to meet her excruciatingly slow pace.

"Holy fuck, baby, keep it up and I'll cum before I even get inside you," he moaned, undone by the pleasure and the sight of her on her knees before him.

She gave his balls a soft squeeze in answer, not varying her slow caress no matter how he urged and finally begged, the pressure building to unbearable intensity. Just when he was about to burst, when the heavy veins in his cock pulsed with growing pressure, she gave him a gentle nip and let him go with a soft, "plop," an utterly bewitching smile on her glistening lips.

"I gotta get inside you, yo!" Reno desperately said, fumbling with his shoes and slapping for the light switch all at once. He turned back to her, barefoot and ready, his open pants hanging off of his sinewy hips.

She was standing before him like an angel come to earth, her hands at the zipper of her long leather coat. There was a keen amusement in her eyes, a secretive smirk as she finally revealed what he'd so greedily wanted to see. The zipper came down and the coat slid to the floor.

For a second all he could register was flawless white skin and a body as toned and lithe as he'd imagined.

She started laughing at the dawning shock on his face—belly deep laughter that brought tears of mirth to her jade eyes as she stood before him in just those skin-tight leather pants and her boots and her glorious skin.

"_WHOA_!" Reno shouted, eyes so wide that the whites showed, shoving his hands into his red mane with utter astonishment. He took a gasping breath and shook his head once, twice, but what he was seeing still didn't make any sense.

"You're a _dude_, yo!"


	6. Cloud Gets Touched!

Cloud found himself at the bluff again, picking at his mental wounds with the hopeless determination of an addicted masochist. The wind tugged at his hair but he didn't feel it, wasn't aware of the picture he presented with his lithe, compact body and his still, exquisite face—the focus was turned inwards, a desperate attempt to drown the needs of his soul with the guilt that had grown larger each passing day.

He thought of Aerith and her understanding and how enraged he had been when she'd been cut down—but that had not kept him from giving into his lover after her death, when he returned to wreak his havoc. So many people he'd lost and still he'd lain side by side with the man responsible for so much anguish, unable to keep himself from those dark promises…

His sharp senses rang an alarm, cueing him in on the fact that another bike approached. It was near dawn—no one had any business in this desolate place at this hour. But the sudden vibration of his cells and the sudden clamor of the stigma confirmed what his most secret, shameful self had hoped for.

How could he want something so badly and yet hate himself so horribly for it? How had he managed to get his wires crossed so badly? He would blame it on ShinRa but he'd gone to Sephiroth barely out of childhood—probably no older than that boy._ That boy_.

There was the sound of tires on dirt, and then the soft ticking of the engine cooling when it was turned off. Cloud's ears strained to hear the whisper-soft footsteps approaching, and closed his eyes in resignation when a cool, leather-encased hand closed over his cloaked arm.

With sudden perverse cruelty, fingers dug into the dark bruise of the stigma, shooting pain down Cloud's arm and making him hiss. He twisted and backhanded that pretty face hard, whipping his arm around with all of his strength, teeth bared in a scowl of pain.

The boy shook his head, gloved hand lifting to touch the blood at the corner of his smirking mouth, looking at Cloud from behind his hair with cruel, excited eyes. Cloud knew better than to think he'd caught him unawares—it was obvious from his reaction that the little minx had wanted to be struck. He ran his tongue along the blood as the wound closed, Cloud's eyes helplessly tracking the movement, the scowl slowly replaced with his usual calm façade, though his blue eyes glittered brightly with heat.

Cloud lowered his head a little, getting himself under control with difficulty, and turned his attention back to the sunrise, trying desperately to ignore the ravenous hunger unleashed within him. So long, so long since Sephiroth, so long since _anything_, and his flesh was starved for contact.

He felt that slender form slide onto the bike behind him, slim legs gripping Cloud's hips and strong hands sliding along his ribs in a touch that caused an inner shudder. He tensed, rightfully wary, but only felt the soft brush of lips against the rim of his ear, the wet probing of a hot tongue and the whisper of breath as the boy said, "Let's get out of here."

He fit himself to Cloud's back, hands sliding down to grip his hipbones, fingers curling into the hollows so that he was achingly, dangerously close to far more perilous places.

Cloud shuddered hard, head dropping and one arm braced on the bike as that touch played over his senses, sang through his nerve endings. For this he would forsake himself, he would crawl for it or beg—he had before and felt no shame at the time. Here was the one thing that could lay him low without fail, and he had no will to resist it because he wanted it so very, very badly. He _needed_ it.

Cloud spurred the _Fenrir_ down the trail off of the bluff with that boy laughing wildly behind him, deft little hands clenching tight.

He took him to the ruined chapel because he could think of nowhere else. The blasphemy of what he was about to do in that holy place somehow suited him—more fodder for the fire of his guilt when he came back to his senses and regretted what he had done.

Cloud waited for him to slip off the bike before swinging one leg over, his beautiful face a study in absolute blankness. He had shut everything out for so many years that it was natural to him, this stony-faced silence. He gazed at the boy with huge blue eyes that were vague and reserved, though inside Cloud was close to losing his control.

He smiled at Cloud in an utterly predatory way, standing with his arms hanging at his sides and one hip cocked out, one green eye hidden behind that sheaf of silver hair. Sighing, he drifted closer until they were not quite touching. Small hands gripped Cloud's narrow hips, small belly arched gracefully to his while those pale jade eyes pinned him.

"I know what you need," he breathed, sliding his hands down Cloud's loose arms, tipping Cloud's averted face to meet his gaze with a hunger that was pure sex.

That exquisite face tilted up, lips moving steadily towards Cloud's own so that his world narrowed to it—entirely comprised of that moist little mouth. Just like _him_, he checked at the last second, barely a breath between them, and waited for Cloud to close the distance. Token submission, a price to play the game.

Cloud's big blue eyes shuttered and he kissed him—abandoning himself to defeat and feeling a heady, frightening freedom in doing so. It was a kiss that quickly progressed to sharp teeth and battling tongues. The fire flared inside him and Cloud trapped that delicate, slim body in his arms, crushing him, devouring his mouth, shuddering softly at how good it felt to do such things again, to _feel_ again.

He moaned into Cloud's mouth, lips and tongue moving with obvious skill, his body slowly arching and falling, arching and falling, a slow rhythm that drove Cloud mad, a low growl wanting to work its way up from his belly.

'_You don't want to do this_,' he silently warned this sensual child who seemed to know every trick, every submissive little gesture to bring the beast to the fore. '_There's a monster inside me, you don't want to wake it_…'

A strong, slender, determined hand snaked down and gripped Cloud's cock, gripped him _hard_.

Cloud snarled, anger and need fusing into one, swelling fully into that cruel, insistent hand. He flung that feline body roughly away from him, giving him a shove that landed him against the stone of the chapel, arms spread to absorb the shock and a wild grin on his frighteningly young face.

"_That's better_," he hissed, cheeks flushing, chest heaving with excitement, eyes roving greedily over Cloud, who had taken up an automatic defensive stance—legs splayed and fists tight, shoulders singing with tension, his head lowered. The boy flung his head back, lolling it against the wall like a cat, his eyes slit with pleasure.

It was more than Cloud could handle. His anger at Sephiroth, his sense of betrayal and his guilt all fueled him to slam into that slender body, flattening him against the stone wall and tearing at his mouth with kisses. They both gasped for breath, sharp teeth slicing tongues, the coppery taste of mingled blood filling their mouths. Cloud pulled those narrow hips up sharply against his, furious with this innocent-looking child whose body moved like a whore and whose touch could set him on fire.

For all of those who had only known sex as an act of love, sex as an act of punishment was a completely alien idea—but it was one with which Cloud was very familiar, an act that was rape in all but the consenting. _Sephiroth_ had taught him that as well, the many facets of that particular jewel. And Cloud had been an apt pupil because he'd been so very, very in love, and hadn't understood in his terrible youth and innocence that a sharing of bodies did not, in fact, imply a return of love. He hadn't understood that Sephiroth used his splendid body like a tool and that his lovers—Cloud included—were only pawns…

The boy moaned in sharp protest, his small hands clenched in Cloud's hair, his desperate little mewls in keeping with the hot throb of his sex buried beneath layers of leather.

"Why did you come to me?" Cloud asked, holding him still against the wall, moving back for some breathing room, trying to get a handle on the anger and frustration that threatened to spill from him in violent waves.

"Because you would never come to me," was the whispered answer, his mouth trickling blood down his narrow chin, his full lips cut and bruised and achingly erotic. He tilted his head a little and purred, "You're a hard man, brother—cold as a grave and hiding such _fire_ inside you. Let it out."

The next whispered phrase decided it for him.

"_I'm_ not afraid of burning."

That beast inside him growled, rolling steadily closer to the surface. Cloud fought it back with difficulty, torn by the desire to just unleash himself—this kid was more than capable of handling himself, it would seem.

"Come on, Cloud," that purring voice taunted. "Or did you sink your libido along with that fucking bitch he killed?"

Cloud's blue eyes narrowed to dangerous slits, his slender body trembling with anger and that heady desire pulsing through him. He lost his short, token battle with the beast and felt it spreading over him, all of the fury and anger and hurt of the last few years, all of the things he'd never shown, never let on were there, never allowed to escape.

Cloud gripped that narrow shoulder and spun him around, knocking him flat into the wall, his face grim and dark, sweet satisfaction working through him. The boy clutched the stone, breathing raggedly, not attempting to escape or fight back—he knew what he'd been doing, picking at Cloud's scabs, and basked now in the repercussions.

With silent, angry movements smooth as silk, Cloud yanked up the zipper on the back of that leather coat and then yanked up the zipper on front until he could tear at the laces on his pants.

"Take your gloves off, I want to feel you," he moaned, pressing into Cloud's hand when he brushed his sex, forcing those tight leather pants down around his hips.

"No," Cloud said, knowing this game well, knowing what to withhold to punish, to wound, _pain_. He kept that lithe body pressed flat against the wall with one hand in the small of his back, his other hand working to free himself of the cloak, loosening his belt. He managed to get it open and slid the belt from its loops, snatching up those delicate wrists in one hand and forcing them over his head.

"What are you doing?" the boy laughed, back arched prettily while Cloud bound those slim wrists tightly together above his head.

"I don't trust you," Cloud said, the burning in him about to consume him. He needed nothing more right now than to _feel_ it, the insistent throb of his erection uncomfortable in his loose pants. He shoved the kid's pants down to the fastened buckles of the coat and pulled his hips back to bow his back, lifting a small, perfect ass out of all that dark leather.

Cloud got his own pants undone, fighting the buttons with grim frenzy until he could pull himself out, catching his breath a little at the touch. Even that he'd denied himself, his only release coming in restless midnight hours when he'd wake shuddering, coated in cum. He worked the tip with his gloved thumb, still keeping a hand on that boy's hip, coaxing out a dribble of precum so he wasn't going in dry. He parted those perfect cheeks and nudged into him, heart hammering as he was slowly enveloped in tight, gripping heat.

The boy moaned, his body almost boneless in pleasure, his hips lifting of their own accord to push himself back against Cloud, who managed to keep a rational portion of his mind through his anger and held back, not wanting to cause true damage.

"Hurt me," he breathed, his head hanging and his bound hands clenching the wall tightly. "_Hurt me_!"

'_It's okay, Cloud, you can't hurt me_…'

And this was why he could never go to Tifa's bed—the fundamental difference between can't and _will_.

Cloud drove into that yielding body so hard that it thumped into the wall and the boy screamed wildly, legs spread as far as his constricting pants would allow, ass rocking back in time with Cloud's frantic, harsh thrusts.

"Yes, yes, _yes_! Hurt me, hurt me, ahhhhhh!"

Undone, Cloud wrenched the leather away from the pale perfection of his throat and sank his teeth into the tender juncture of neck and shoulder, blood welling up into his mouth and his body pulsing with pleasure. It was almost too much sensation after so long untouched, the ripple of that tight body around him and those wailing, mewling cries for more. The beast he lived in fear of consumed him completely, working his teeth deeper into that soft flesh, driving his hips harder into that perfect ass, seducing his hand down to grip the kid's admirable erection in a hand that was hard and cruel, milking it roughly while Cloud's hips drove him into the raspy stone.

The boy screamed again, a primal, victorious sound, his cum spurting up over Cloud's fiercely pulling fist, his body clenching spastically in an orgasm that rolled his jade eyes back in his head and made every muscle in his body go rigid.

That tight body clenched down on him and Cloud snarled, coming so hard that bright tears welled in his eyes, every ounce of him behind the deep thrust that sank him ball-deep, his cock erupting in viscous gushes. He trembled, panting, rocking tighter and tighter to that round ass, the climax peaking and racing along his senses long after he'd shot the last of his load. Every little twitch of that tight body set off a new starburst of sensation that sent it spiraling higher, a raging orgasm that had him groaning in mingled pain and pleasure, eyes wide with shock.

"It's good, isn't it?" the boy laughed, rhythmically rocking his hips and forcing Cloud to hiss, his body shuddering from such prolonged pleasure. It seemed content to last as long as he moved and Cloud writhed, teeth clenched, hips straining convulsively and a long, low, agonized moan ripping from his mouth. With a final burst of sensation that left spots dancing before his eyes, it finally faded, leaving him sweating and shaken, utterly spent.

"Well," he sighed, easily slipping his bonds, reaching back to grip Cloud's hips and grind against him. "You certainly had a load to blow."

Still stunned from that startling orgasm, Cloud just panted, one arm braced on the wall and his head hanging.

The kid eased off of him, righting his own clothing before tucking Cloud back into his. He grabbed Cloud's unresisting hand, leading him into the church, saying with a wicked smirk, "That was just the froth off the beer, brother—now it's time to get drunk."


	7. Reno Can Take A Joke!

"_WHOA_!" Reno shouted, eyes so wide that the whites showed, shoving his hands into his red mane with utter astonishment. He took a gasping breath and shook his head once, twice, but what he was seeing still didn't make any sense.

"You're a _dude_, yo!"

She—no, _he_—couldn't seem to stop laughing, his slender body shaking with it, every fresh peal of it seeming to startle him with its force. There were even tears streaming down his perfect face, silver lines down the pale hollows of his cheeks.

"I wondered how long it would take you to notice," he gasped, more laughter bubbling up. "You certainly are _dense_."

"Oh my god!" Reno moaned, hands pressed to his forehead, wide eyes staring uncomprehendingly at the slender man before him. '_I just let a dude suck my cock_!' And following that were thoughts of how awesome that interrupted blow-job had actually been…

"Argh! _Fuck_!" he yelled, smacking his head in an attempt to dislodge those thoughts while that leonine man broke out into fresh laughter.

"See," he teased, bending down to retrieve his coat. "I told you we'd see about you keeping it up."

Reno automatically defended himself, saying with outraged cockiness and a finger pointing at his crotch, "_Hey_, baby, I got _no_ problems keeping it up, yo!"

With dismay he realized that the shock had certainly had no effect on his enthusiasm—or maybe he'd just been that good with his pretty pink mouth…

"_Damn_!" He yelled, clenching his eyes closed, his skittering, drunk mind reeling. "I'm _way_ too drunk for this shit, yo!"

"Oh my…I don't think I've ever laughed so hard before," the man said, wiping his vivid green eyes and absently pulling his fingers through the silver silk of his hair.

Reno watched him in utter misery, thinking he was absolute perfection, beautiful and sultry—and wishing like hell that he was a _chick_. He realized with a start that the man was pulling on his coat, zipping that delicious expanse of creamy white skin up behind that chocolate-colored leather.

"Hey, what…what're you doin', yo?" he questioned, mouth suddenly dry.

The man's eyebrow rose as he buckled on his shoulder-guards. "How drunk _are_ you?" he purred, smirking. "I'm _dressing_, you idiot."

"Wait, hold on, yo!" Reno protested, leaning heavily against the door and shaking his shaggy head, exclaiming to himself, "What the fuck am I _doing_?"

"I wouldn't dare to venture a guess," the man smoothly said, amused, strapping his gun to his back. "You're a charming, amusing fool but you _are_ rather baffling."

"_Hang on_!" Reno shouted, spread arms blocking the door, hands gripping the door-jamb like grim death, tensing when the other man moved fluidly over to him. Sweat popped out on his brow and the throbbing in his groin notched up a bit, seeing the man move like that. "What am I doing? _What am I _doing?!"

"Blocking the door," the man said, no longer amused. "It was a joke, Reno—I just wanted to see how long it would take you to puzzle out that I wasn't a woman, idiot. Now _move_, before _I_ move you."

Reno hesitated, desperately trying to drag his mind out the drunken haze and figure out what he planned on doing. He shifted uncertainly away from the door, the man murmuring, "Thank you."

But when he made to open the door Reno moved without thinking, scooping one strong, slender arm around the man's narrow waist and slinging him back, saying with a hint of panic, "Hold it! I gave you a promise, yo!"

Exasperated, the man rolled his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest. "You promised a _woman_, you oaf," he reminded. "You're _straight_, Reno—clearly you've never done anything with another man."

"Of _course_ I haven't!" Reno said, offended. "I'm straight, yo! Straight as they come!"

"Well," the man said, smirking. "I'm sure even a drunken fool like you can figure out the obvious problem here."

"Just…" Reno helplessly said, hands spread out before him in pleading, his brain trying to catch up with his thoughts and shying away from them immediately. "Just give me a second to process, yo."

The man sighed, toe tapping for a moment, and then went for the door again with an exasperated, "Hmph."

"_Wait_!" Reno said again, and this time when he grabbed him there was fire in his blue eyes. "You ain't going _nowhere_, yo!"

The man gave him a scathing look and tightly said, "It was just a game, Reno. I'm sorry that I let it go so far but I would not suggest that you _tease_ me."

Reno was breathing hard, conflicted, unwilling to let him leave but unwilling to plow ahead, though his body clearly had no such qualms. Acting on impulse, he took two quick, cat-light steps on bare feet towards the silently seething man and gave him a rough, desperate, hysterical kiss.

The man tensed, taken aback, his response uncertain as Reno plunged his tongue into his mouth.

It was the same hot mouth, the same soft lips, the same skillful tongue—it was hard for Reno to wrap his mind around the idea that this was a _dude_, so he shoved the thought away and kissed him until he got a sudden, hungry response.

He broke away, trying to catch his breath, filling his gaze with the man's cool, reserved, utterly breathtaking face.

"God, you're gorgeous, yo," Reno hoarsely said, realizing belatedly that he was holding tightly to the man's curved hips.

"Yazoo," he softly said, and at Reno's puzzled look he added with a smile, "My name is Yazoo, not 'yo'."

Reno grinned crookedly. "Yazoo," he murmured. "This would be so much easier if you were a chick."

"Hmph," was the reply, those jade eyes assessing him. "The line's been crossed, Reno—there's no backing out now."

Reno swallowed hard but only nodded, too enticed to let gender stop him now. "Let's do this, yo," he decided, jerking that slender body close.

The man's delicate hand pressed to his sternum, a firm pressure that kept him from closing the distance. For all his slender grace there was an unyielding power in him. This guy was _strong_ and, quite possibly, the hottest piece of ass Reno had seen in a very long time.

"Wait," Yazoo purred, his eyes intense and wary. "Are you _sure_ about this?"

Reno considered the question for about a second, tilting his head, a lock of his wild, screaming-red hair falling over his brow. "Yeah," he said, shrugging his slim, strong shoulders, pushing against the hand that held him away. "Nothing quite like a walk on the wild side."

Yazoo relaxed a little, the tension leaving his long-fingered hand and a genuine smile gracing his perfect lips.

"You're even more goddamned gorgeous when you smile, yo," Reno weakly said, tingles gathering in his lower belly, his erection pressing insistently against his open pants.

"You're not so bad yourself, fox-face," Yazoo said, amused, a light fingertip tracing the red slash tattooed on Reno's cheek. Reno had an inkling that this man was only ever like this in private, with the promise of intimacy in the air—his earlier reserve gave Reno the impression of someone under tight control, schooled in the art of utter isolation, skilled at keeping himself aloof and others at a distance.

"You don't let this happen much, baby, do you?" he questioned, cupping that heart-shaped face, watching those jade eyes sweep closed in sudden yielding softness. So what if this wasn't a chick? He had the same giving, compliant gentility of the fairer sex—just with an extra bit tacked on.

"Rarely," Yazoo sighed, his breath whispering over Reno's skin, those eyes fluttering back open. "_Very_ rarely."

"Then you're hot for this, too, yo!" Reno crowed, pleased.

"You have no idea," Yazoo purred, that soft voice going straight to the pit of Reno's stomach to stoke the fire there. He stepped back, hands unfastening his weapon and shoulder-guards with the ease of long experience. Reno watched him undress, enraptured by his every move as the coat came off, then the boots, then _everything_ until the man was naked.

He got a nasty punch to the gut when his eyes fell on Yazoo's full groin, still startled to find a penis instead of the usual.

"Reality kicking in?" Yazoo asked, laughing a little.

Reno couldn't stop his reaction—he glanced down his belly at his swollen cock, a reflexive size-check that made Yazoo laugh again, fondly saying, "Idiot."

"I can't help it, yo!" Reno said, defensive. "It's a reflex!"

"Shut up, will you?" Yazoo teased, sliding up against him in an overwhelming sensation of silky skin and soft hair. The slender column of his throat begged love-bites, the dip of his clavicle enticingly smooth. Reno gave in, letting his tongue rove over that alabaster skin, hands clenched in the muscle of Yazoo's back. The man locked those incredibly strong arms around him and arched into him, the contact jolting him, feeling far better than it probably should. He was shocked once again at how easy it was to forget that this was a _guy_ he was lapping up so greedily, though Yazoo was undeniably masculine. The slim, pale man fit into a category of not-guy, isolating him from other men and making it somehow okay to plunge a tongue down his throat and want to do him.

He felt Yazoo's soft mouth on his temple, cool hands on his back, taut belly rolling under the hesitant brush of his fingers.

'_I'm not gay, yo_,' Reno reminded himself, and the thought consoled him as he bit Yazoo's slim shoulder, his hand splayed on the man's belly, thumb circling his belly button. The sweet dimple there brought other holes to mind and Reno pulled back, announcing with a challenging scowl, "_I'm_ the dude, yo!"

Yazoo laughed throatily and purred, "I certainly hope so, it's been ages since I've had a hard fuck."

Reno stared at him in amazement, brain skipping on one thought, '_Fucking amazing, fucking perfect, fucking freaky little fuck_!'

"I been dreamin' somebody like you would come along, yo," he said, and added with a grin, "Guess I shoulda been more specific on the gender."

"You can't say you don't like what you see," Yazoo said, smiling, giving Reno's straining cock a hard tug that made him gasp, back arching.

"I _really_ like what I see, yo!" he said, admiring the contrast of his hand on Yazoo's belly. Reno's skin was the delicate, translucent white of a true red-head, the veins showing up in faint blue webbing beneath the surface. Yazoo's pale skin was the shade of ivory, creamy and pearlescent with the faintest hint of warm color, like a drop of toffee in a cup of cream. The thought of it made Reno's mouth water, knowing now that Yazoo tasted as good as he looked. Yazoo's lids lowered over his jade eyes, coming to rest at half-mast in a look that was calculated and utterly erotic.

Reno swallowed hard again, drunken brain swimming. In a shaky voice he said, "I gotta get in you before I cum in my pants, baby."

"Then I suggest you get those pants _off_," Yazoo replied, backing to the bed and lounging back on it like a lithe lion, his amused jade eyes so hot they burned holes in Reno's crotch.

"Holy _fuck_," Reno whispered to himself, kicking his pants off on his way to the bed, standing there in mingled eagerness and bewilderment, not quite sure of what to do.

Yazoo decided for him and reached up, scraping sharp little nails down Reno's lean belly and smoothly palming his cock, pulling just hard enough to force Reno onto the bed on his knees.

"Come here," he murmured, pulling Reno closer to his face.

"Oh _no_!" Reno said, sitting back on his heels and shaking his head. "Not _that_—I'll definitely cum if you do _that_ again! I never had such a good blow!"

"I'm flattered," Yazoo said, sitting up and bracing himself on his hands so that he could run his tongue in a slow, wet trail from Reno's navel to the hollow of his throat.

Reno moaned, watching him do it, goosebumps lifting on his skin. He saw Yazoo's swollen cock and screwed his eyes shut for a moment, the whole thing surreal to him suddenly. Reno in bed with a dude—_nobody_ saw that one coming.

"Stop thinking, idiot," Yazoo whispered, nipping him on his side where he was ticklish, one hand reaching up to cup his balls and make him moan. The bed shifted as Yazoo got up on his own knees before him, kissing him again, still palming his balls, his free hand drawing Reno's own to his cock.

Reno resisted for a moment, glad that he was kissing—an excuse to keep his eyes shut tight. Hesitantly, he brushed his fingers over Yazoo's hot erection, the skin so silky-soft and smooth that it actually wasn't unpleasant to touch. Unsure of himself, Reno slid his hand around the shaft and lightly squeezed it, startled when Yazoo moaned breathlessly into his mouth, "You're a tease, fox-face."

"I don't look like a fox, yo!" Reno argued, eyes popping open to find Yazoo smiling at him, thoroughly amused, not knowing that his drawn eyebrows gave him the look of a delicate canid even more. His hand unintentionally tightened on Yazoo's flesh and the man moaned, breathing, "_That's_ more like it, you little fox."

Reno grinned suddenly, this whole guy-thing not so hard after all. It was like masturbating, just from a different angle. He gave Yazoo's flesh a few experimental strokes and found that the man gasped loudest when he was rough, his hot flesh pulsing and his delicate hands trembling on Reno's shoulders.

"What was that you were sayin', yo?" Reno questioned, grinning to see Yazoo all hot and bothered for him. "You think I look like a fox? Foxes are sexy, right? 'Cause I'm _damned_ sexy, yo, so they _must_ be."

"Shut up," Yazoo groaned, and kissed him roughly, moaning into his mouth, "Foxes are _very_ sexy."

A few more seconds of that and Yazoo was tumbling backwards, dragging Reno down on top of him. He got another jolt of sinking surprise when his cock met Yazoo's, the delicious friction making it somehow more disturbing. But the man was arching beneath him and doing things with his body _no one_ should be able to do—supple, snake-like movements that hit all the right places at all the right times.

"No more foreplay," he panted, kissing Reno hard, shoving him up on hands and knees and wriggling down his body.

"Hey, what—" the question died on his lips as Yazoo swallowed him down, making a sloppy wet mess of him.

"Now," Yazoo said, wriggling back into place. His long, slender, hairless legs moved slowly and gracefully up to fold over Reno's shoulders. His jade eyes were alight with hunger, his slender body taut. "_Let's fuck_."

'_I can do this, I can do this, no problem, yo_,' Reno frantically thought. He felt Yazoo shift up a little, his hand under himself to guide Reno in. Eyes wide in morbid, disbelieving curiosity, Reno watched himself push into resisting flesh, saying in a long, drawn out whisper, "_Fuuuuuuuuuuck_..."

"It's getting there," Yazoo breathlessly said, sliding his hand up to join the other over his head.

Reno pressed deeper, eyes nearly crossing with pleasure as the tight muscle gripped him, pushing to expel him and contracting in reflex. His mouth was hanging open in shock at how good it felt and he pressed deeper and deeper until he could go no farther, so tight up against Yazoo's ass that his balls ached.

"I want you to fuck me, Reno, not just _stare_ at me," Yazoo moaned, and rocked his hips up in a way that had Reno gasping for air and clutching for the headboard.

"Oh my god, baby, you're fuckin' _hot_," he groaned, pulling out a little and thrusting back in, trying to be careful but it felt so good he just wanted to slam into him.

"Do it!" Yazoo hissed, sensing his thoughts. "You can't possibly hurt me, Reno. Be as rough as you want."

"But I'm a gentle lover, yo," he protested, clinging to what he knew—girls.

"If you're the best lay around you will pound me through this mattress, fox-face," Yazoo growled, eyes blazing.

Reno closed his eyes, slid out dangerously far, and slammed his hips up _hard_, balls connecting satisfyingly with Yazoo's flesh. The man wailed sharply beneath him, back arching and pink mouth open, an expression of utter bliss on his perfect face. Reno loomed over him, driving into him for all he was worth, rough and fast, the growing pressure in his balls telling him that it was going to get touch and go real quick. He couldn't tear his eyes off of Yazoo's perfect, flushed face, the pleasure in it so obvious that it edged him dangerously close.

"Oh, just like that," Yazoo breathed, tilting his hips and his eyes growing hazy, unfocused. His body clenched around Reno's, his stiff cock twitching on his lean belly.

Reno pounded away, thinking of baseball, thinking of _anything_ that would keep him from coming. But it was hard to concentrate on anything but Yazoo's gorgeous face, on Yazoo's lithe body, on Yazoo's swollen, straining cock. His eyes were drawn to it again and with a sinking feeling he realized it was doing it for him—he was definitely liking the looks of it.

"I'll owe you one, fox-face," Yazoo moaned, writhing beneath him, his hands clenched on the head of the mattress, a fine sheen of sweat making his skin glisten. "It's been too long, I'm gonna—"

He clenched his teeth, back arching hard, ass clamping down on Reno. And Reno's shocked eyes were glued to his cock as Yazoo came, heavy streams of cum shooting from the thick, bouncing meat of it.

"Oh _god_," Reno choked, the sight enough to do it—he'd just watched a guy cum and he'd gotten off on it. _Hardcore_ gotten off on it. '_I did that, I made him cum without even touching his cock! That was me, I fucked him into coming_!' The thought chased itself through his brain as it spiraled towards a climax. In that split second before the orgasm hit he heard Yazoo's soft voice.

"Reno, you still want to cum on my face?"

"_Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck_!"

And everything exploded into perfect, aching bliss, his hips arching wildly as he came inside Yazoo's amazing, tight ass. The pleasure of it washed over him in deep, breathless waves, his wide blue eyes fixed on Yazoo's jade ones, his hands clenched hard on the headboard. It was too much, this gorgeous, feline man beneath him. Even as the orgasm faded he felt himself twitch and knew what was about to happen next, though it hadn't happened since he was a teenager with endless stamina.

"Oh god, oh god, oh _god_!" he moaned, eyes fixed on Yazoo's mouth, panting so hard he was nearly hyperventilating, feeling it washing up his nerve-endings with relentless promise.

Yazoo flicked his pink tongue over his pink lips, dragged his fingers through the cooling cum on his belly, and dipped his fingers into his mouth.

With a helpless, utterly blissful gasp, Reno came again, cock throbbing inside Yazoo and slender body shuddering. It was a dry-cum, bone-crunching and muscle-straining and utterly delicious. When it passed he slumped down on top of Yazoo, not even caring that another dude's cum was getting on him.

"Did you just get there twice?" Yazoo asked, sounding rather intrigued.

"Mmphf," was all Reno could manage, panting hard against Yazoo's shoulder. He roused himself enough to say, "I learned it from a whore, s'not so hard when you figure out how but it kinda hurts—you got it over on me, though, yo—I couldn't help myself."

Reno lay there on top of Yazoo, drunk and tired and utterly replete. He'd just fucked a guy senseless and gotten off on it harder than he'd ever gotten off before.

"Stop thinking, idiot," Yazoo murmured, sounding sated and sleepy.

Reno closed his eyes with a sigh, his brain spinning drunkenly as he tumbled into sleep.


	8. Kadaj Wakes the Beast!

"That was just the froth off the beer, brother—now it's time to get drunk."

Kadaj made his lolling way into the chapel with his usual lazy, hip-swinging gait, his stubborn brother in tow. His tilted jade-green eyes took the crumbling place in, squinting a little from the sunshine beginning to fill the stained-glass. Turning, he gave Cloud a greedy once-over—but Cloud had retreated back behind a wall of silence, his lowered blue eyes filled with mingled puzzlement and pain. Kadaj sighed a little in irritation, not having the patience to deal with him, remembering him through Sephiroth's memories—an eager, open child, a cocky but uncertain teenager, a broken but brash man—and now this introspective silence. He was so beautiful it made one pause at the sight of his slim, triangular, feline face and its perpetual air of brooding sadness. Those huge, shadowed, glowing eyes were the windows to one suffering, enigmatic soul…and it made Kadaj lick his girlish lips in anticipation. He'd always been drawn more to men than to women, liking their rough strength, liking that they weren't so easily cowed. Cloud might be encased in a shell of indifference, but Kadaj knew that beneath his calm exterior he housed the burning viciousness of a warrior—and he was determined to bring all that force to bear upon him.

"Shocked?" Kadaj questioned, knowing how shaken Cloud had been by that unexpectedly drawn-out orgasm. He released Cloud's unresisting hand and looked at him. His brother stood there in the center of the chapel, concentrating on some inner complexity, his soft mouth loose and his head tilted down. Always averting that pretty face, embarrassed by the attention it always got him. "It started for us about a year ago, another gift."

He sighed and swung away, taking stock of the damaged church. A place of worship was it? Well, Kadaj could use a little worship…

He unbuckled the _souba_ and draped it on a mildewed pew before unclasping the buckles above his knees. He unzipped his coat, pulled off his gloves, and slid out of all that leather with slow, languorous movements. He caught Cloud observing him, those glowing eyes moiling in that impassive face.

Gloriously bare in the morning chill but for his boots and his partially laced pants, Kadaj sauntered slowly back to his brother. He reached out and dragged the zipper down the front of Cloud's sweater with deliberate slowness.

Cloud tensed in gradual response as the swell of his chest and the ripple of his belly were exposed. Kadaj flicked the zipper down, unfastening it, and purred to see Cloud's bared flesh. The man was lean and muscled, the light creating hollows and dips on the ridge of his belly where a single, light pink scar interrupted the perfection of him.

Kadaj ran a fingertip down it, feeling Cloud's skin leap in response, his belly twitching.

'_This is where Sephiroth ran him through_,' he thought, briefly recalling an automatic reaction to searing pain and an immediate sense of horror when Cloud's pale, drawn face emerged from the anguish…

Unable to resist, he bent and slid his tongue in a wet, lazy trail down that scar, dipping down between his flesh and the constricting lip of his jeans, tasting salt and something that was uniquely _Cloud_.

Cloud jerked back, a low, harsh growl escaping him, his gloved hand wrenching Kadaj's head away.

"Don't," he lowly said, the word clipped and angry. It was a reflex action on his part, the furious guarding of a wound that had caused him great pain and nearly cost him his life.

Kadaj enjoyed the tight grip on his hair, loved the power behind the muscled arm that held him away so cruelly—this was what he wanted, this force, this promise of violence. Looking for a reaction from his quiet, reserved brother, he wet his lips and whispered, "What's wrong, Cloud? Afraid I'll open old wounds? Don't worry, I could never hurt you like _you_ hurt _him_—"

Cloud's face tightened in hurt anger and a second later Kadaj was seeing stars as Cloud backhanded him, wrenching his head against the hold on his hair.

He winced, tasting blood, but it was worth it to feel that strength, to see the dawning horror and disbelief on his brother's face.

Cloud released the smaller boy with a soft sound of self-loathing, his eyes horrified but strangely _alive_.

Kadaj slid against him, skin to skin, hands drawing sharp nails up Cloud's ribs until the older man bit his lip, eyes closed to keep him out. But he was still here, still suffering Kadaj's touches. Somewhere in that conflicted mind of his Cloud wanted this—_badly_.

Kadaj played his mouth over Cloud's throat—such a smooth column of flesh, vulnerable and surprisingly slender for so fit a man. He nuzzled his nose under his jaw, licking and breathing on his skin, sliding his hands under Cloud's loosened sweater to lightly rake his nails down his back.

Tension thrummed in that slender, strong body, Cloud's pulse skipping beneath Kadaj's soft, questing lips.

He sighed and dropped his head, turning his face away from Kadaj's, his hands fisting at his sides. The movement pushed the strong cords of his throat against his skin, taut beneath the surface.

Kadaj, never a gentle lover, tilted his head and gave Cloud's tender throat a hard bite.

Cloud caught his breath, tensing to pull away. Kadaj gripped his back with unyielding little hands and sank his teeth deeper until salty blood spilled into his mouth. He felt his brother's jaw clench, the man's strong hands lifting to grip his slim shoulders and push in token resistance.

The boy made a soft sound of sheer bliss and sucked on the broken skin between his teeth, feeling an overwhelming urge to simply bite down and swallow, to _devour_ this delicious flesh in his hands.

Cloud gave him a shove, wincing, the wound knitting itself instantly. His blue eyes were dark and accusing, hurt but flashing with returning desire. "Why are you like this?" he asked, disturbed, his low voice so very pleasant.

Kadaj stared at the soft curve of his lower lip, wanting to suck on it. "I don't know," he murmured. "It's just the way I am…"

He grinned at the wariness that seeped through Cloud's mask. _Finally_ he was reacting, loosing that infuriating distance that urged Kadaj to push and push—he didn't care if the response was positive or negative, so long as there was a reaction.

Those gloved hands were warm on his shoulders, the right one sticky with drying cum. Kadaj shuddered, thinking of that furious, fast fuck against the wall, his brother using his slender body to blow off years of neglect. It had been harsh and graceless and utterly mind-blowing, Cloud acting like a man ridden by demons that drove him to do something his mind refused to accept. And Kadaj was simply _aching_ to make him do it again.

He dug his nails slowly but surely into Cloud's back, winning a flicker of need from that stoic face, a slight quickening of his breath and a subtle tensing of his body telling Kadaj that he was on the right track. He had an advantage and he knew it—_his_ memories of Cloud and what he needed, what he craved before others had made him believe it was wrong and twisted.

"I won't stop," Kadaj whispered. "I won't stop until you make me and then…well, we'll see."

Cloud took an unsteady breath, his huge, sparkling eyes gazing down at Kadaj with dismay and ravenous hunger, fingers clenching hard on his shoulders. The younger man slid one hand down and around over Cloud's groin, finding him hard and hot, a delicious weight and thickness in his greedy little palm.

"It scares you to think how young I am, doesn't it?" he whispered, shoving his hand down Cloud's pants to grab him inside the constriction of his jeans, roughly stroking him to force a breathy hiss from Cloud's clenched teeth. "Such a pretty little boy, so young and innocent. Such a bad, bad man to want to do such terrible things to such a baby."

Cloud drew his in breath as a sharp gasp, his grip tightening in time with Kadaj's firm hold on his throbbing cock, that perfect mouth whispering those disturbing words up with an utterly jaded look on his utterly innocent face.

"Come on, Cloud, it's okay," Kadaj breathed, working his hand up and down in steady, rough friction. "I won't tell anybody that you want to fuck me up the ass. I won't breathe a word of how you want me to suck you off. It'll be our little secret, you wanting to blow your load on my sweet little face—"

Cloud snarled in frustrated anger, giving Kadaj a shove that sent him backing up into the back of a pew, a cruel smile on his feline lips and his slender body trembling.

"Disgusting," Cloud panted, his face taut with aversion. He wiped his mouth with his wrist as if to erase the taste of his little brother.

"Not such a little boy, am I?" Kadaj purred, laughing mirthlessly. "I haven't been a child for a very long time, brother."

"Clearly," Cloud bit out, anger and need boiling beneath the surface, leaking out in the angry narrowing of his eyes and the unconscious curl of his lips. "_Filthy_."

"And what does that make you?" Kadaj inquired, genuinely amused now. "That was quite a load you busted in me, Cloud—dare I call you a pedophile?"

Cloud clenched his fist, right hand reaching for the hilt of his sword, falling back into a furious crouch. He was livid, upset by his brother's words and stung by their truth—what he condemned in Kadaj was what drew him in like a siren's song.

"You would kill me in this holy place?" his little brother laughed, silver eyebrows rising in mock shock. He pushed away from the pew and moved lazily down the center aisle, grinning with mad delight. Glancing back at Cloud, he tilted his head and said, "A place of worship…" He faced his brother and lifted his arms in a pose of peaceful welcoming, purring, "Then worship me, brother."

Cloud came at him with a vicious snarl, the sword flashing in the growing light, reflecting off of Kadaj's wide, excited eyes as it arced down to strike him…only to bite deeply into the wood between his booted feet. He lifted his gaze slowly to see his brother gripping the hilt still, shuddering with anger, his lips parted over clenched teeth and his eyes ablaze with mako light. Kadaj smirked, arms slowly falling to his sides and head tipping gently back to offer Cloud the sight of his defenseless, delicate throat.

"Worship me," he whispered, the words echoing with power.

Cloud made a keening, frustrated sound in his throat, eerily similar to a wolf's angry snarl, and jerked Kadaj over the sword into his arms.

"Worship me, worship me," he moaned, locking his legs around Cloud's hips, baring his throat to Cloud's sharp teeth, locking his arms around the man's wide shoulders. His senses spun in abandon as his brother carried him to a bedroll in the corner, moving slowly to bite and suck at his throat, hard hands cupping Kadaj's round bottom, bouncing him with every step. "Make me _feel_ it…"

There was no frantic need now; Cloud's movements were slow and precise, calculated to tease. He'd slipped whatever yoke of guilt he'd carried for so long and was finally the man behind the mask—methodical and intense with Sephiroth's own darkness in his blood. He went to the ground with Kadaj riding his hips, bent to lay the boy down on his back and strip him of his boots, working them off with rough, confident hands.

"Today, _I_ am your god," Kadaj breathed, breathless to see Cloud returning his intent gaze, pulling off his goggles, unbuckling the leather straps of his harness and shoulder-guard, divesting himself of his sweater and gloves and that half-cloak he used to hide the stigma. His perfect mouth was parted softly, his breathing steady and even, his belly tightening with each breath. He was preternaturally beautiful—a combination of excellent genetics and Jenova's desire to seduce. He shed his boots, his pants hanging on by a prayer, clinging to his narrow hips, his erection magnificent and clearly outlined as it strained against the confines of his jeans. He turned back to Kadaj with an enigmatic smile and crawled over him on all fours, his body moving with the same fluid grace of a leopard's.

Kadaj pushed himself up on his elbows beneath Cloud's looming body, eyes losing their focus at the licking hunger he saw in his brother's face. Something predatory and cruel lurked there, bubbling up beneath the surface, something Cloud and not-Cloud—something Sephiroth had only awakened, but not created.

"Worship _you_?" Cloud asked, his voice silky. "Who would fall on their knees and beg to feel it? Who would lash out and wound, utter the worst of obscenities, and demand to be taken?"

Kadaj wet his lips, the faint stirrings of nervousness only serving to arouse him further. True violence hid behind Cloud's calm surface, perhaps never fully unleashed as he'd always played second to Sephiroth's dominance.

"Brother, I—"

"_Beg me_," Cloud breathed, that darkness billowing up inside him, his blue eyes glowing brightly with heat. He traced Kadaj's cheek with absorbed fascination, once again giving the boy the unsettling feeling that this wasn't his older brother at all but some beast wearing Cloud's skin. Those blue eyes snapped onto his own and Cloud smiled a devastatingly cruel smile at him, white teeth flashing as he murmured, "We'll see who is worshipped, _little brother_."

Kadaj shuddered, panting, leaning up to wrap one hand over the base of Cloud's neck, hanging on for dear life as he kissed him, a frantic and half-mad kiss that returned to him sevenfold. He was mewling, utterly lost in Cloud's so-soft, so-cruel mouth, sobbing harshly when Cloud's corded arm moved languidly and his hand cupped the flesh between his spread legs, squeezing hard enough to make Kadaj wince. But the pain was so sweet, and the pleasure even sweeter.

"_Beg me_," Cloud whispered against his lips, shoving his legs wide, roughly cupping him until Kadaj was stiff behind the laces of his pants, wriggling and needy as never before. "Do it, little brother—_beg_."

Kadaj rebelled at the idea, mouth open to protest but all that came out was a breathless, sobbing moan.

Cloud's mouth drew up in a slight, tight smile, and that hand moved swiftly, slapping down against Kadaj's aching flesh with stinging force.

He was breathless for one long, breathless second, and then the sensation hit him like a bucket of cold water, echoing up from his balls to his brain in a wash of agonizing bliss. Harsh, ragged cries tore from his perfect lips and his hips jumped in a reflexive twitch. He clenched his teeth, breath hissing between them, eyes rolling up to see Cloud staring at him with the amused reserve of a heartless god.

"Where's that sharp tongue now, little boy?" that not-Cloud purred, vivid blue eyes dilated so far they were bright rings around swimming blackness, lids half-closed in an expression that was as disturbing as it was beautiful.

_Smack_. That hand came down on him with cracking force, all the strength of Cloud's muscled arm behind it.

Kadaj sobbed, tears of pain squeezing from the corners of his eyes. He let go of Cloud's neck and fell back, writhing, back arching as the anguish shot up from his groin to his head, singing along his nerves in a message that crossed somehow—pleasure from pain, his body hardening even more beneath this torture.

Cloud spanked him again and once again harder, watching him with impassive amusement.

Once more and Kadaj trembled on the cusp of an explosive orgasm, the blinding tear of sensation leaving him twisting madly, his breath escaping through his clenched teeth in a repetitive prayer, "Oh god! Oh god! Oh _god_!"

Cloud bent over him, forehead pressed to Kadaj's, seeming to drink the mingled pain and pleasure from his skin.

"_Who is the god_ now?"

Kadaj hissed at him, eyes watering, trembling on the verge of a climax that Cloud made no move to give him.

"P…please, brother," he brokenly said, as he'd only ever begged to Yazoo, and never in such earnest _need_, for his brother hadn't the heart to deny him. Cloud, however, was as unmovable as stone, waiting to hear what he'd asked for. "Please, brother! I'm begging you!"

"Mmmm," Cloud purred, moving fluidly back. He jerked Kadaj's pants down and yanked them off, unmindful of the boy's helpless yelp as his abused erection was exposed. He moved his lips up the inside of Kadaj's thigh, lips skimming smoothly over his soft skin, sending him into a panting panic as he neared but did not touch his aching balls or his straining cock. Instead, he breathed his way up the other inner thigh, finally burying his tongue in the soft crease where Kadaj's slim leg merged into his groin.

"Oh god!" Kadaj whimpered again, clutching wildly at the bedroll, tears streaming down his face.

"Such a bad, bad man," Cloud whispered, curling his tongue over Kadaj's tender balls. "Such a bad, bad man to do such things to an innocent little boy."

Kadaj panted, the alien feeling of fear welling up inside him. The darkness he sought in every man was so much darker in Cloud—and it wasn't even the darkness of Sephiroth, it was the darkness that Sephiroth had _seen_, had wanted to possess, had gloried in each and every time he'd fucked Cloud into oblivion.

Cloud's blue eyes fastened onto his. Braced on his taut arms with his head low he was the picture of a predatory feline—sultry, merciless eyes, lean face, mouth with gently quirked ends that gave him a cat's same enigmatic smile. Those eyes bore into him, more Cloud than, perhaps, anything else had ever been.

"_Such a bad, bad boy_," he whispered, and drew his wet, hot tongue up Kadaj's pulsing cock from the base of his balls to his quivering tip.

Kadaj bucked under the pressure of his tongue, coming hard, hot cum spurting up his narrow belly to lace his soft skin. He gasped breathlessly, writhing as it just kept going, nearly screaming when Cloud's mouth slid over the head and neatly down his length in a long, slow suck.

"Please don't stop!" he begged, bucking into that mouth, wailing at the pleasure of it as the climax hit him again and again. Mother's gift—spread Jenova's cells, get it up quicker, keep it up longer, and shoot a double. Just when the border of pleasure and pain crossed too far to feel good anymore, the orgasm faded and Cloud released him with a final soft suck.

Cloud sat back, loosening his pants and pulling that rather formidable cock out. He rolled Kadaj's legs up, propping them over one shoulder. His eyes glittered with cruel delight and he said, "Today, _I am your god_."

And Kadaj sobbed in blissful release as Cloud shoved roughly inside of him.


	9. Rainchecks!

**A/N: Apologies for the reposts—there's some irritating glitch to this FanFiction that has a nasty habit of randomly inserting "f"s into my documents. At first I thought I was losing it, but now I'm fairly certain it's a glitch. Sorry for the inconvenience, I'll do my best to catch it before actually posting the damned things.**

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Yazoo woke with a dry mouth and a warm weight covering him like a blanket. Faint daylight was stealing into the room, not that it mattered much since the light was still on. Ruefully thinking that he'd had far too much to drink last night, he cast a critical eye over the shabby room and gave a disgusted, "Hmph!" He was _so_ much better than _this_.

Vivid red hair tickled his nose and he turned his attention to the man draped over him, taking a moment to admire the translucent whiteness of his skin and the long, lean expanse of his back. He had more of those strange orange-red slashes tattooed symmetrically down his back, winging out from his spine like stripes on a tiger.

Reno stirred against his shoulder, lifting his shaggy head to rest his pointed chin on Yazoo's chest, the leanness of his face and his thin lips combining with his red hair to make him look uncannily like a sly fox.

"Fox-face," Yazoo murmured, smiling a little at how utterly disarming this loud, cocky drunkard could be.

Reno made a grumpy sound and opened his eyes—enormous, foggy blue eyes in that sharp white face.

"What it is, yo?" he rasped, his voice rough with the early hour.

"That's incomprehensible," Yazoo informed him, pushing that rather coarse red hair away from his face. "Are you still drunk?"

"Maaaaaybe," Reno drawled. "Are you in love with me?"

"You _are_ still drunk," Yazoo decided, still amused by his utter confidence.

"You _are_ in love with me," Reno said with a satisfied smirk. "Sorry, baby, I'm straight."

"_Clearly_," Yazoo wryly said, rolling his eyes. Still, he _was_ strangely curious about this man who seemed to expect women to fall into his lap and absolutely refused to take no for an answer to _anything_, up to and including, 'Are you a woman?' "Do you do this often?"

"All the time, baby," Reno answered, pressing his cheek to Yazoo's chest so that his voice was muffled. "One hundred percent in customer satisfaction, yo...And you're totally in love with me."

"Idiot," Yazoo said, unable to resist laughing softly at his nerve. Wanting to touch him, Yazoo slid his hands over Reno's strong, narrow shoulders and worked his fingers into the rangy muscle, smoothing and soothing the knots he found on Reno's lanky frame.

"You're _so_ in love with me," Reno said in a sing-song voice, grinning against his skin.

"You're _such_ an idiot," Yazoo sang back, grinning in response.

Something started beeping and Reno reluctantly groped over the side of the bed, fishing his cell phone out of his discarded pants. Propping his chin back on Yazoo's chest he answered with mock seriousness and the hint of a mischievous smile, "Fox-face here, yo!" He laughed at the reaction from the other end. "What it is? Na…" His blue eyes sized up Yazoo, who merely quirked an eyebrow. "I guess you could say that…Pale hair and bright green eyes—prettiest piece of ass I've ever fucked!...Yeah, _sure_ I will. Later, yo."

He flipped the phone closed and sighed, checking the time. "Gotta go to work in three hours, baby."

"More certified ass kicking?" Yazoo teased.

"Nah, just tuning up the 'copter, yo—got some shit the man wants added on before we head to the Northern Crater next week," Reno told him, blue eyes suddenly absorbed in staring at Yazoo's lips. "Fuckin' chick lips, baby—hot as fuck."

"You work on helicopters?" Yazoo laughed. "I thought all you could do was drink!"

"So many questions…you _do_ love me!" Reno grinned, lifting up to stack his hands under his chin and raise his face level with Yazoo's. "You're crazy about me, yo! Prolly gonna start stalkin' me and shit, aren't you?"

Yazoo laughed and slapped him playfully.

"Fuckin' fine with me, gorgeous cock-packin' chick hunting me down," Reno teased. "Nah, baby, I _fly_ 'copters."

"Ah…so _that's_ why you never take off those stupid goggles?" Yazoo asked, chuckling when Reno asked, "What goggles, yo?" and scratched his hairline beneath the object in question.

Silence fell over them, a silence that Yazoo used to tentatively search his connection to his brothers. He felt Loz like a steady stream of encompassing warmth, his touch welcoming and delighted to feel him. Yazoo got a hazy view of an animated, beautiful brunette arguing philosophy with Loz while curled up naked against his chest—his brother's idea of basking in the aftermath. He reached out for Kadaj, extra careful to keep all sense of Reno out of his touch, and felt the baby thrumming with terrified excitement. He got a split-second, crisp flash of Cloud's pretty China-doll face before the baby graciously invited Yazoo to leave and indulge in self-abuse, the connection slamming closed like a door.

"You still with me, gorgeous?" Reno asked, smiling a little at Yazoo's far-away look. He sat up and flung his long legs over the edge of the bed, searching for his smokes and lighting one up before laying back down, pillowing his head on Yazoo's stomach. "If you were a chick…"

"If I were a woman I certainly wouldn't be _here_," Yazoo said, absently stroking Reno's long ponytail.

"You think you can do better than here?" Reno asked, gesturing grandly at the shabby room.

"I think I can do better than _you_," Yazoo lightly replied.

"Whoa, _harsh_, yo!" Reno laughed. "If I didn't know you loved me I'd take that to heart, baby!"

"I don't _love_ you, idiot!" Yazoo said, exasperated.

"Yeah, _right_," Reno snorted, flicking his cigarette carelessly at a round metal can near the door, already bored with it. He got up and hit the head, spreading out on the bed when he returned while Yazoo did the same. The slender man came back with a questionable glass of water, sipping at it gingerly. "Such a good little girl."

Yazoo scowled at his fox-like grin and the expectant hand he held out for the cup, half-tempted to dump it on him. Instead, he graciously handed it over and watched Reno drain it down.

"Come to daddy, baby," Reno said, giving him an outrageous leer calculated to amuse.

Yazoo dissolved into laughter, appalled, wriggling in token resistance when Reno reached out and grabbed him, dragging him down onto the mattress and tickling him breathless. His writhing had a rather pleasant effect on Reno, who wound up with a raging hard-on pressing hotly to Yazoo's flank. Even the lean red-head seemed a little awed by it, giving Yazoo a shit-eating grin and saying with no little self-importance, "See that? Yeah, that's all _me_, baby!"

Yazoo's laughter tapered off and he caught Reno's eye, shifting a little beneath him, quickly catching up.

"Still not gay?" he murmured, smirking.

"Straight as an arrow," Reno told him, and added with a sly grin, "Still wanna cum on that pretty face, though, yo."

Yazoo shivered, assaulted by a sudden vision of Reno towering over him, milking ropes of hot cum onto his face…he mewled a little, rolling onto his back beneath the slim man.

"Oooooo," Reno breathed, smiling. "_That_ got you going. What else do you like, baby? Maybe a golden shower? A little spanking? Rim-jobs?"

"Been there and done that, Reno," Yazoo purred, watching the man's eyes widen with pleased surprise. "How about you?"

Reno seemed as speechless as he'd been the night before and Yazoo smiled inside, realizing that behind the vacant, fascinated expression on his face his brain was stuck on instant replay of Yazoo's words.

"Don't worry," Yazoo whispered, softly pinching Reno's nipples. "I'll let you be the man _this_ time."

"Ughn," Reno grunted, cock bobbing in a sudden spasm of arousal, his blue eyes huge. Sounding far less convinced, he brokenly whispered, "I ain't gay, yo…"

"Could've fooled me," Yazoo murmured, leaning up to bite and suck on those pert little nipples, to worship Reno's slender, pale throat and leave marks that would bruise his delicate skin. He bit his ear, sucking on the hoop earring, and harshly hissed, "Get me off, fox-face."

Reno moaned a little, mouth suddenly coming down to suck on Yazoo's offered throat, to bite and bruise his way down to the hot swell of his sex. He hesitated, uncertainty shining through the sensual heat in his eyes, clearly trying to come to grips with the idea that he was about to suck on a cock.

Yazoo fell back on the bed and looked down his body, catching Reno's almost frightened eyes. With calculated sensuality he flicked his tongue out, unrolling it suggestively and tracing his lips, Reno's eyes fastened on the movement. "Get me off," he whispered, and reached down to touch himself.

"Stop that, yo, I'm working on it!" Reno said, slapping his hand away and looking at Yazoo's cock with renewed determination. "I don't wanna fuck this up, I ain't ever done it before."

"Less talking," Yazoo suggested, aching to feel it, wondering how different Reno's mouth would be compared to Kadaj's experienced skill.

Reno swallowed hard and, exhaling in a huge sigh, dipped his head and closed his wet mouth over the sticky head of Yazoo's cock. He sucked, choked, gagged for a second and tried again, one hand steadying the thickness of it with a hard grip that made Yazoo breathlessly hiss, "_Yes_!" He caught a rhythm, kept the suction going, and opened his eyes to see if Yazoo was enjoying himself.

The look on Yazoo's face nearly made him cum, his body convulsing in a short, sweet spasm of pleasure. The slender man writhed slowly on the bed, hips lifting rhythmically to meet his sucking mouth, his jade eyes unfocused and utterly sensual, his pink mouth loose and moist.

Shifting himself around to brace on one arm, Reno tickled his fingers over Yazoo's hairless balls, wetting them in saliva. On a devilish impulse he slipped his fingers down under Yazoo's balls, sliding slowly downwards. The slender man caught his breath and opened his legs wide, tilting his hips up for Reno's questing fingers to find him. He sobbed in pleasure when Reno slid two fingers inside him, the curve of his fingers finding his sweet spot.

Yazoo's reactions hit Reno like a physical touch, so stimulating he was lucky he didn't blow his load all over the goddamned bed instead of in that pretty face. He clung desperately to his control and sucked hard on the fat cock in his mouth, keeping a rhythm with his thrusting fingers that had Yazoo writhing wildly and sobbing in pleasure. A bit more of that and Yazoo tensed, coming with a desperate, sobbing, "_Reno_!"

Thick, creamy cum hit his throat and he swallowed reflexively even as it grossed him out. But the body squeezing his fingers didn't gross him out, nor did the swollen flesh pulsing madly in his mouth. He sucked and sucked, hand sliding in the wake of his mouth, Yazoo's flesh vibrating beneath him. The pale man kept coming even after he'd shot his load, his body writhing madly and his eyes wild, almost scared. He panted, gripping Reno's hair, and eventually pulled the man's mouth off of him, his face a mixture of utter pleasure and pain.

He fixed Reno with a look hot enough to burn and purred, "Let's have it, Fox-face."

"Holy _fuck_, baby—you're so goddamned _hot_," Reno whispered, shaking off the hand in his hair and moving up on all fours over Yazoo, who'd propped himself up on the meager pillow to offer that beautiful face for defilement.

Reno was so strung he was ready to blow, one hand on the headboard and the other fisting his cock, his eyes glued to Yazoo's half-lidded eyes and calm, sultry face. Yazoo lazily licked his lips and Reno swallowed a whimper, surging into his hand as the pleasure rocketed him towards climax. Yazoo slid a long, delicate finger into his perfect pink mouth, sucking on it until Reno was nearly drooling, jerking frantically on his flesh.

"Just a taste, fox-face," Yazoo murmured, and Reno groaned to feel that finger slide up inside him, groaned again even louder when Yazoo gently probed his prostate, a firm and slow pressure that had him gasping for breath in a heartbeat.

"Here it comes, baby," Reno moaned, wide eyes fixed on Yazoo's face. He cried out harshly with pleasure and came, just the sight of it shooting out onto Yazoo's gorgeous face enough to make him cum harder, hissing softly between his clenched teeth, "_Fucking amazing little fuck_!" It spurted out in heavy streams, lacing Yazoo's face and hair, Reno's body shuddering with it. He felt it again, the orgasm that hit its peak and threatened to return.

"_Do it, baby_," he harshly whispered, pulling hard on his cock. "_Make me _feel_ it_."

Yazoo smiled, his finger working with slow, steady pressure in contrast to Reno's frenzied, fisted hand. The feeling was amazing and he started to work it up, knowing that if he just worked his hand hard enough, if he was just hot enough, he would get that awful, delicious dry-cum again.

Yazoo said, "Hmph," opened his pink mouth and languidly licked his lips, letting a viscous line of cum drip into his open, waiting mouth.

Reno sobbed in grateful relief, every muscle snapping taut as he felt it rip up from his balls, a dribble of creamy fluid seeping from his tip. Half-laughing and panting, he shuddered in bliss, slowly coming down off it, staring at Yazoo's streaked face.

The slender man pulled his finger out and wiped his face with his other hand, pushing the cum down to his chin and flinging it away, still licking his lips like it was the tastiest thing he'd ever had.

"Oh my god, yo, you keep at it like that, Yazoo, and I'm gonna make you my girlfriend," Reno panted, grinning. "Can't seem to help myself—you're turning me into a double-tapper."

Yazoo gazed up at him and lightly asked, "Don't you mean _boyfriend_?"

"Nah," Reno said, shaking his head and moving off of his body. "_I'm_ the guy, that makes _you_ the girlfriend."

"Idiot," Yazoo sighed, still smiling.

"C'mon, baby, let's get showered," Reno suggested, looking at his dropped cell phone with a rueful sigh. "I gotta go, yo."

Yazoo hesitated. Though intimate acts through the years had inured him to being nude, the simple privacy of showering left him feeling rather uneasy. He fucked his lovers and then he left them—he'd never shared something as personal as a shower with even Kadaj. But Reno left him little choice, the rangy man pulled him from the bed and into the cracked, stained little shower, his usual ridiculous charm putting Yazoo at ease as they cleaned up.

"Hey, Reno," Yazoo said, leaning against the back wall while Reno rinsed off. "Wanna give me a golden shower?"

The red-head almost choked on his own tongue, his eyes huge in his pale face, made even larger by the vivid hair plastered in wet streams down his face and throat. He looked younger somehow without that wild mane, even more like a delicate fox. But the grin he gave Yazoo was all Reno, one hundred percent cocky and one hundred percent absurd.

"Yo, baby, you gotta stop being so fuckin' freaky, I got places to be," he said, the protest half-hearted. He looked at Yazoo and cursed good-naturedly, shaking his head and sighing, "You want to get loony in the shower and I prolly can't get it up—lucky you."

"Rain-check," Yazoo murmured, though he had been teasing and had only said it to make Reno react. It really was amazing what this man was prepared to do. Did nothing shock him? Did nothing _stop_ him?

They got out and dried off, hunting for their clothes.

"Fucking working on my only day off," Reno complained, yanking on his pants and belting them at his narrow waist. "Don't get me wrong, baby, I love working for ShinRa, but the mission ain't happening until next week—so what the fuck?"

"_ShinRa_?" Yazoo echoed, absolutely shocked, his hands pausing in the act of tying his pants.

"Yep, I'm a Turk, yo," Reno said, not noticing Yazoo's reaction, busy pulling on his socks and boots.

"And you have to go to the Northern Crater?" Yazoo faintly asked, stomach sinking with dread.

"What ShinRa wants, ShinRa gets, yo," Reno easily said, shrugging into his shirt.

"Reno?" Yazoo said, his pale hands absently pulling the laces of his pants and knotting them.

"What it is, baby?" Reno inquired, realizing that several buttons on his dress shirt were MIA. He looked up at Yazoo, curious to see the other man so _worried_.

"When you go to the Northern Crater for ShinRa you won't…I mean…" he struggled for words, his jade eyes disturbed. "You won't go in, will you? Do you leave the helicopter and go on foot?"

"No way, baby, I stay with the bird," Reno told him, giving him a puzzled smile. His smile turned into a grin and he moved up to pull Yazoo into a loose embrace, teasing, "See, you _are_ in love with me. Worryin' about me and wantin' to make me dinner."

"I don't want to make you dinner," Yazoo protested, startled into laughter.

"Sweet, perfect girlfriend" Reno murmured, and kissed him lightly, then again with a little more heat before pulling away with a groan, accusing, "You gotta _stop_ that, yo!"

Bewildered but amused, Yazoo finished dressing, slowly steeling himself against this adorable man and his far-too endearing ways.

Reno managed to get his shirt to stay closed and pulled on his jacket, making sure his keys and smokes and phone were in his pockets. He spied his goggles near the sink and retrieved them, slipping them on with a satisfied sigh. He turned and watched Yazoo finishing up, amazed at the change in his heated lover. Yazoo used his clothing like armor, encasing himself in a shell of leather and weaponry that left him as cool and unapproachable as an assassin. Reno could _feel_ the difference in him—gone was the laughing, sultry siren who had brought him such explosive pleasure. In his place was a calm, utterly reserved, almost priestly man with secretive jade eyes and a beautiful, expressionless face. Looking at him Reno thought with chagrin that he must've been stupid-drunk to ever mistake this dangerous-looking, tightly-controlled man for a woman.

"Thank you, Reno," Yazoo said, and there was a sad longing in that voice.

Reno didn't like that sadness but he didn't know how to fix it. As Yazoo started for the door he gave into his natural impetuousness and halted him, breathlessly saying, "What about my rain-check?"

"Rain-check?" Yazoo questioned, uncertain.

"Yeah, yo, the golden shower—you said rain-check," Reno said, privately thinking he was fucking _brilliant_. "Where do you live?"

"I'm between homes right now," Yazoo said, his voice faintly shocked as if he couldn't believe that Reno was still pursuing him.

"Well, you gotta be stayin' _somewhere_, yo," Reno reasoned. "Where at?"

"I'm only passing through," Yazoo answered, schooling himself to remain unmoved because this utterly endearing and charming man was an enemy—one of the Turks.

"Aw, jeez, baby, if I didn't know you were madly in love with me I'd think you were trying to give me the blow off," Reno said, tilting his fox-face and giving Yazoo an easy, relaxed grin. He shook his head and laughed in exasperation, saying, "Nah, that _can't_ be it—not from my pretty little girlfriend."

"I'm not a girl," Yazoo weakly protested, feeling his defenses crumbling under the sheer force of Reno's personality.

"What's your phone number?" Reno asked, whipping out his cell phone. When Yazoo hesitated he said with cocky condescension, "Hey, I went _fag_ for you, lady—try to have some appreciation, yo."

Yazoo smiled despite himself and gave Reno his cell number, feeling his phone vibrate against his back when the man immediately called him.

"There, now I got you!" Reno crowed, pleased. "I know I shouldn't have given you my phone number 'cause now you'll be callin' me all the time wanting to talk about _feelings_ and _where this relationship is going_ and that kind of shit, yo."

He paused, giving Yazoo his disarming smile that made his blue eyes glow, sparkling with amusement, and sighed, "But I guess that's alright, 'cause you're my girlfriend."

"I think you're…you're," Yazoo said, struggling to find the words.

"Beautiful? Dead sexy?" Reno suggested. "The man of your dreams? The love of your life? A sex god?"

"An idiot," Yazoo finished simply, smiling at him.

"I love you too, yo," Reno said, winking. He turned to get the last of his things, and when he looked back Yazoo was gone.


	10. What Belongs To Kadaj!

**I revised some of the other chapters, thanks for the feedback, people.**

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And Kadaj sobbed in blissful release as Cloud shoved roughly inside of him.

It was as exquisite as it had been the time before, only instead of bruising insistence Cloud was shoving into him with slow determination. His blue eyes were nearly all black now, swallowed by his dilated pupils, his pink mouth parted in a faint, fascinated smile. He easily held Kadaj's slender legs over his left shoulder, his right hand gripping the slender youth's hip so hard that the bone complained.

"Brother," Kadaj brokenly said, still sobbing because the pain and the pleasure had fused into something that transcended both—leaving him overwhelmed and completely at the mercy of his older brother.

Alas, Cloud was not in the mood for mercy.

Rocking back on his heels, he dragged those slim hips into his lap, pulling Kadaj half off of the ground, and slowly arched his own hips in a movement that lifted the smaller youth.

Kadaj cried out, the position combining with his tightly clasped legs to make the fit even less plausible, Cloud's rather intimidating cock tearing him wide open until the boy could hardly stand it. Every deep push of him pressed against his sweet spot, making him writhe.

Cloud's hungry, predatory eyes watched Kadaj squirming and begging with amused reserve, not even attempting to comply with his pleading demands. The fuck outside truly had been the froth off of the beer and now Cloud was lost in the beast he'd tried so hard to restrain. Now that it was awake, now that it felt so _perfect_, he was unwilling to stop—deep down, in the part of his soul that watched unaffected, he knew that when it was over and the haze of the beast's demands receded, he would punish himself with renewed vigor. He'd spent so long denying, so long hating himself that he was in no hurry to rush back to it.

He gripped Kadaj's hips hard and bent over him, folding that compliant body in half and making that innocent, flushed face wince in sudden pain. _This_ was what he wanted, someone to suffer for _him_, someone willing to undergo pain for the pleasure of having him. It was the same utter submission he had given so willingly to Sephiroth and had been unable to find in any other lover he'd had.

That small flicker of pain forced a hiss from his mouth and quickened his pace. He bent his head and bit at Kadaj's soft lower lip, locking that soft mouth into a fierce, breathless kiss. He braced his arms on either side of Kadaj's head, letting those slim legs fall to one side, folded around his hip. The boy twisted beneath him, a swift, cat-like movement as he pressed his round bottom into Cloud's groin and got his legs under him. He reared up beneath Cloud, on his knees with his arms pillowing his forehead on the ground, legs spread wide and back bowed, knowing just what to do to let his brother have full depth and control.

Cloud lay over his back, braced on one arm, his other hand tangling in pale silver locks to wrench that delicate head back. Biting that tender earlobe with quick cruelty, he hissed into his ear, "Now, worship _me_," punctuating his order with a hard slap on that perfect ass as he straightened behind him.

Kadaj moaned and arched his back, bracing his little hands beneath him and pushing back insistently against Cloud's hard body, working himself on the still man whose hands lightly brushed his back and hips. He was sweating in the cool morning air, his body straining, shoving back against his brother with frantic need. He felt that cock swelling within him, could feel every pulse of Cloud inside him and it drove him nearly mad. Panting and clenching his teeth in effort, he moved with single-minded determination to _feel _that encompassing bliss.

He was so close he could taste it, and Cloud's fingers were clenching in his flesh, soft little sighs spilling from his lips.

"Not yet," he suddenly said, gripping Kadaj around the waist and lifting him, sliding out. He flipped the younger man's body and slammed him back down on his back, pausing long enough to bite Kadaj's tight little nipples so hard he left a bloody ring of marks around them. He bit those slim thighs, that belly, sucked on that stirring cock so roughly that it sprang to sudden life. When he had his slender sylph weeping beneath him he finally shoved back inside that tight body and pounded deep, holding up Kadaj's hips for better access.

Kadaj rocked up against him in time with his quickening thrusts. He saw those blue eyes _shift_—the pupils contracting briefly to pinpoints, leaving Cloud's eyes all glowing blue. His head dropped back, a lock of wheat-blond hair dipping over his eye. His eyes widened and he shivered and Kadaj knew he was almost there.

Ready to feel it himself, Kadaj sank his nails into Cloud's belly over that scar and scored his flesh, dragging his nails down to skip from Cloud's body to his own. He began pulling on his own flesh, rapidly working towards an orgasm. His brother gasped a little to see it, pushing deeper and harder with more urgency. With his other hand he reached under his own bottom and cupped Cloud's balls, slowly tightening his grip until Cloud winced, his blue eyes huge as his lean body surged in a climax.

Kadaj came in the face of seeing Cloud's pleasure, writhing on that fat cock while it chased over his senses. They were locked together in breathless need, each body thrumming with tension as it tore through them—that painfully sweet sustained orgasm.

When Cloud slumped on top of him Kadaj knew it was over. The blue eyes that lifted to his were utterly shocked and perfectly normal but for the unearthly glow of mako. His delicate, cat-like face showed the remnants of pleasure and a dawning horror. Before it could overwhelm the creature who had pleasured Kadaj so relentlessly, the boy swiftly kissed him, feeling an answering response from that lush, soft mouth.

Cloud's softening body slipped out of him with a gush of cum and blood, wetting the bedroll beneath them. His taut, muscled body pushed lightly off of Kadaj as he backed away, shaking his head to clear it of the last vestiges of the beast—it was satisfied for the moment, abandoning Cloud to his guilt.

He looked at the boy still laying on the bedroll, his pale skin flushed and coated with a light sheen of sweat. There was a sated, sultry look on his face that had no business being present on one so young, and Cloud turned his head away in shame, even as the last shockwaves of pleasure shot through him.

"Leave me," he lowly said, head bowed, shuddering a little in mingled disgrace and arousal as he recalled what they had done.

"I'll never leave you, brother," Kadaj said, smirking at his sudden reticence. Sighing at Cloud's retreat into silent recriminations, Kadaj quickly got dressed, hunting up his clothing from its various places. He paused at Cloud's sword and pulled it free with a soft grunt of effort. Swinging it experimentally in his left hand, he strode over to his brother and whipped the sharp blade to rest against Cloud's vulnerable throat.

When Cloud looked up at him there was only resignation on his beautiful face, an expression that clearly conveyed the thought that he not only deserved such a thing, he _welcomed_ it. Bothered by it, Kadaj covered his sudden twinge of conscience with a sultry smile and stuck the sword into the floor next to Cloud.

Cloud's shimmering eyes blinked once slowly, and then he lowered his lovely face again, on his knees on his bedroll and looking utterly lost and abused.

Kadaj gripped his chin and tipped his head up, pressing a deep kiss to those lax, parted lips, letting his tongue tease Cloud's until he responded. "_I will never leave you_," Kadaj insisted, pulling Cloud up to cradle his head to his belly. "Whatever you may think of me, however you may hate yourself, we are _brothers_. "

Stroking Cloud's blond hair and smiling a little to himself in mad glee, Kadaj softly added, "After all, you're _mine_ now, brother…"

Cloud shook him off after a split-second of allowing it, and dressed himself with sharp, angry movements, raking his hand through his spiky hair to push it out of his face.

He was furious with himself for taking advantage of a kid who had obviously been used, and badly. He was angry with himself for needing it so much that he was willing to sacrifice his morals and beliefs to satisfy his flesh. He needed his young lover _away_ from him, needed to rid himself of proof of his guilt.

"I'll never leave you," Kadaj said again, watching him with the peculiar enjoyment of one who owns something utterly. Allowing Cloud to deal with his demons, Kadaj silently made his way out of the chapel and, chuckling at the cruelty of it, took Cloud's _Fenrir_ to go get his own bike.

Cloud would have a long, reflective walk ahead of him, compliments of Kadaj.


	11. Lovers' Secrets

Yazoo retuned to their room far later than he'd actually planned. To his dismay Kadaj was already back, pacing furiously while Loz watched him with barely concealed concern.

"_Where've you been_?" Kadaj hissed, stopping in mid-pace, turning to face his brother with his tense little fists clenched.

"Likewise," Yazoo replied, remaining calm, keeping himself safe behind the shell of cold indifference that so upset and perplexed the baby. "That certainly wasn't Mother's face I got a glimpse of when I touched you this morning."

Kadaj seethed, looking fairly caught out, but calmed a little when Loz cupped his shoulders from behind, murmuring to him.

"You've been with someone, haven't you?" Kadaj asked, swinging from fury to hurt, though it still escaped Yazoo _why_. Kadaj took lovers when the mood hit him, cruelly flaunting them to his brothers, but went into a perfectly psychopathic fit when Yazoo or Loz returned the favor. But he never _ever_ said those words that he demanded to hear from his brothers. "At least Loz doesn't _like_ his lovers!"

Yazoo laughed a little, knowing that was a lie. His large, rather sensitive brother wouldn't dream of engaging in an act of love with someone he didn't like. Loz was definitely the most romantic of the three, and often cried a little when they moved on to another town, sad to leave behind the people he had touched.

"So what if I was with someone?" Yazoo coolly asked, tilting his head to the side and smirking at his seething younger brother. "What business is if of yours when you spent the night chasing down and seducing Cloud Strife? It isn't as if you _love_ me, after all."

Kadaj hissed at him, nearly shouting, "_You_ are_ my business_! How _dare_ you leave me here and go searching for someone to fuck?! Do you think I would've found him if _you_ had been here instead?"

Yazoo weighed his answer carefully, knowing he was pushing Kadaj dangerously close to an explosive temper tantrum, and then casually replied, "I don't think even Mother herself could keep you out of _his_ pants, little brother."

Kadaj snarled and shook Loz off, rearing back and slapping Yazoo hard in the face.

Yazoo laughed, straightening, his hand cupping his burning cheek. Loz shot him a look that clearly begged, 'Why are you _teasing_ him?' and hastened to intervene but Kadaj shoved him out of the way with a fretful, "Tsk!"

"Such a temper, _koishii_, oy," he sighed, amused, lowering his lids. "If you loved me half so well as you loved our big brother, perhaps I would not be tempted to seek comfort elsewhere…"

Kadaj panted, staring at him, trembling on the verge of a full-out fit.

"But _I_ love _you_, Kadaj," Yazoo sighed, shaking his head a little because it was true. He loved the baby with everything in him, even his madness and cruelty. "And because I love you I'll tell you a secret my lover told me."

"_I don't give a _fuck!" Kadaj snapped, shifting rapidly to sulky in the wake of Yazoo's admission of love. Whatever Cloud had done to the baby certainly had him excitable, bouncing from one emotion to the next with insane speed. He crossed his arms over his slender, well-formed chest and turned his back on Yazoo.

"Now, now, don't fight," Loz crooned, giving Yazoo a dirty, exasperated look. He maneuvered his trim, muscular body closer to Kadaj and pulled the sullen baby into his arms, stroking his stiff back and cajoling him as he would any girl who was upset.

Miffed, the baby turned his face away but allowed Loz to hold him.

"It just so happens, Kadaj," Yazoo said, drifting up to his back and sliding his arms around the baby's slender waist, embracing Loz's arms as well, locked as they were to each other. He nuzzled Kadaj's delicate ear and breathed into it, "My lover works for _ShinRa_."

Kadaj went absolutely still with shock. Forgetting his anger, he turned his head to look at Yazoo, who draped over his shoulder, and asked with dangerously unstable excitement, "Did he mention Mother?"

"It would seem that they are planning an expedition, but you're probably not interested in _that_," Yazoo lazily said, letting go of Kadaj to swing around Loz's back, leaning back against that broad expanse of heat and muscle that had always been his steadying force in this insane world.

With the same determined, brutal curiosity of a child, Kadaj reached around Loz and gripped Yazoo's arm, wrenching him sharply closer, his green eyes sparkling with the flame of destiny.

"_Where are they going_?"

Yazoo smiled at him and asked, "Would you believe me if I told you? You never believe me when I say that I love you…"

Uncertainty fell over the baby like a blanket, and his soft little face slowly lifted in a sensual smile.

"Yazoo," he purred, turning in Loz's embrace to lean around his bicep, his hard hand shifting from Yazoo's arm to his cheek. Those green eyes blinked lazily, suffused with an utter sensuousness. For a gut-wrenching second Yazoo saw huge blue eyes instead—huge blue eyes and a lean fox-face with a wide, easy grin.

He twitched and hoped Kadaj had not noticed.

"Yazoo," the baby purred again, pulling him close for a scorching kiss. "Of _course_ you love me. There's nothing you wouldn't do for me…Now, where are they going?"

"They're going to the Northern Crater next week," Yazoo murmured, turning against Loz's back to kiss the baby again, just because his gorgeous little face was so close and kissable.

The baby was absorbed in his words, drawing back mid-kiss to whisper to himself, "The Northern Crater! Of _course_!"

"That's far," Loz said, letting Kadaj cling to him in excitement. He steadied the boy easily with one arm, glancing back at Yazoo to ask, "Will we make it?"

"They're taking a helicopter," Yazoo said, resting his cheek on Loz's arm. It was good to be near his brothers, good to feel safe again. Reno had made him feel so strange, like he never wanted to come back—like he wanted to be a person like any other and be with that infuriatingly ridiculous man who moved and looked like a light, sly little fox. "If we leave now, we may beat them."

Kadaj grinned with madness and pulled away, dragging Yazoo in between him and Loz before pressing him into a deep, breathless kiss. He flung his slender, strong arms around Yazoo's neck and held fast, Loz reaching around to hug them both, the baby's driving _need_ to find Mother infecting them yet again.


	12. Just Gonna Go Rub One Out!

Reno leaned back on the sleek black car, propped on his elbows with a content, pleased look on his face.

"You're drunk, aren't you?" Rude inquired, standing like a true military man with his back straight and his gloved hands crossed politely in front of him. He didn't turn around to look at Reno, he already knew what the little snot was doing.

"Maaaaaybe," Reno drawled, tapping his fingers on the hood. "How long are they gonna be in there, yo?"

Rude shrugged.

"You get paid however long it takes," he pointed out, making Reno nod in agreement. No arguing with that.

"_Bor_ing, _fuck_," Reno swore, and winked at a passing woman, who smiled and blushed. _She_ didn't come over to him and palm his crotch. _She_ wasn't going to suck his tongue into her mouth like she wanted to eat it. _She_ was what Reno was used to, and today it strangely bored him. He pretended not to notice when she hesitated, waiting for him to talk to her, and a second later she went along her way.

"Are you passed out now or just being picky?" Rude asked.

Reno sighed and splayed out on the hood, closing his eyes and saying, "Fuck, I dunno, yo."

"Not like you to pass up the gentler sex," his partner observed.

"Whatever, yo, I'm fuckin' drunk," Reno replied, and indeed the alcohol was warming his belly quite nicely. He thought of the girl who had passed him, how he would've gotten a number and maybe taken her to dinner…or straight back to her place. He hoped his little crossing of the border didn't herald a change in taste for him—he liked chicks. No, he _really_ did!

But he'd certainly enjoyed every second with Yazoo…

"Yeah, well…" he pushed himself up, waiting for his vision to steady, and shoved off of the hood, idly scratching his temple and saying, "…I'm gonna go rub one out, call me if the boss comes back."

Rude grunted in assent, amusement, or disgust, but didn't leave his spot by the car.

"Be back, yo," Reno said, meandering inside of the large, official-looking building and tracking down a head. He took a piss and headed for a stall, fully intending to do just as he'd said.

Thoughts of sex brought on thoughts of Yazoo and, on impulse, Reno scrolled through his phone and rang him up.

After about ten rings Yazoo's sultry, purring voice answered with a breathy, "What is it?"

"Naw, baby, 'What it _is_,' yo!" Reno corrected, grinning like an idiot just to hear his voice.

"Did you want something?" Yazoo asked, the phone crackling like he was in the wind or something.

"You naked in a shower," Reno quipped, idly stroking himself through his pants.

"Bad timing, Reno, I'm on my way out of town," Yazoo said, sounding somehow pleased.

"Left town on me, baby, did you?" Reno teased, grunting a little when his cock twitched at the thought of Yazoo naked. "Some girlfriend _you_ are."

"I'm not a girl," Yazoo answered. And then, suspiciously, "Are you _masturbating_? You're breathing awfully heavy."

"Can't I call up my favorite girlfriend and arrange a date?" Reno sheepishly asked, but still shamelessly unzipped his pants, settling on the toilet seat and leaning back against the tank.

"_Favorite_ girlfriend?" Yazoo echoed, his throaty laughter making Reno's pulse skip. "Do your other girlfriends have cocks, too?"

Reno laughed and easily answered, "_None_ of my girlfriends have cocks, lady. Talk dirty to me, yo."

"It's rather bad timing," Yazoo said, his voice wary. Almost under his breath he said with some amusement, "I _knew_ you were masturbating, you pervert."

"Hey!" Reno said, sounding genuinely put out, but his following statement took the bite out of his tone. "That's _Head_ Pervert to you, yo!"

"I _was_ thinking of you earlier," Yazoo mused.

"Oh yeah?" Reno asked, pleased at how quickly Yazoo could get him hard. He wasted no time, his ultimate goal being to shoot his load and get out of here, blow off a little tension.

"I was thinking of how good it felt when you sucked my cock."

Reno choked in shock, hand clenching on his cock and libido spiking sharply. He grinned and let his head fall back against the wall, picking up his broken rhythm.

"_Really_," he managed to say, groaning a little at the delicious tingles gathering in his groin. "That's impossible, baby, I'm _straight_."

"_Yeah_," Yazoo laughed, and lowered his voice to a sultry whisper. "I must have mixed up my boyfriends—the one I'm thinking of has a long, fat cock and likes to cum in my face."

Reno groaned, laughing breathlessly, fist working quickly over his slick cock. "Keep talkin', yo."

"And he always cums twice," Yazoo added, his amusement evident. "And he's promised me a golden shower the next time we get together—though I'm not sure when that will be."

"Then that was me, baby," Reno moaned, flanks and belly tightening as he worked towards it. Jerking off never took him long, it was a means to an end, not something to be savored. He thought of himself spurting a load on Yazoo's gorgeous face and grunted a little, feeling it throb up through his length as he neared his climax.

"That was _you_?" Yazoo innocently asked. "So it _was_ your huge cock buried in my ass—I wasn't sure. Next time it's going to be the other way around, fox-face—"

—Reno moaned, eyes tightly closing as his body surged hard towards it—

"—and it'll be _my_ huge cock buried in _your_ ass," Yazoo purred.

"Aw, _fuuuuuuuuuuuuck_," Reno hissed, arching his back and shooting his load against the door, his fist milking his strutted sex. Moaning breathlessly, he gasped, "You sure know how to do it to guy, yo!"

"So I've been told," Yazoo's husky voice said. And, laughingly added, "I'll be gentle your first time…"

"Yeah right, not a chance, baby—that cock ain't getting any closer than it already has," Reno said, still stroking himself. With a cocky grin he breathed into the phone, "Can't use that gorgeous face to make me double tap this time, yo. Guess it'll have to wait."

"I guess so. Oh, Reno?" Yazoo asked, his tone conversational.

"What it is, yo?" he inquired, smirking at the mess he'd made.

"Do you have any handcuffs?"

Reno's ears perked up at this, a sinking feeling in his stomach and a responsive pulse in his cock warning him that Yazoo certainly didn't need to use his pretty face to make Reno double-tap. Almost unconsciously he started fisting his cock harder, shivering, answering unsteadily, "….yeah…"

"Do you think you could handcuff me to a wall next time?" Yazoo asked, his voice oh-so-innocent. "I mean, I know it's a weird request, but if you handcuff me to a bed you can't spank me the way I like."

"Spank you?" he echoed weakly, a spasm wracking his lean frame.

"Well, sort of," Yazoo conceded, and cruelly said, "You can use your hand or your belt, so long as you spank my cock—I _love_ that—"

"You're a fuckin' _bitch_!" Reno gasped, climaxing again with the image of himself spanking Yazoo's fat white cock with his bare hand, muscles snapping so taut it seemed they would tear his lanky frame apart. He groaned at the feel of it and slumped tiredly against the toilet, sighing, Yazoo's soft laughter making him smile.

"Got there, didn't you?" the man inquired.

"Oh _yeah_, baby," Reno said, grinning with repletion. "I wanna see you again, Yazoo."

"I don't know if I'll be coming back," Yazoo said, and sounded grave.

"You'd better, I owe you a golden shower, yo!" Reno reminded. "Tell you what, baby—when I get back from my mission I'll give you a call and see where you're at."

There was a long pause from the other end.

"Just don't show up wanting to propose or anything," Reno teased, wiping his hand on some toilet paper and standing to fasten his pants. "It would be kinda awkward since we've only been dating for three months—"

"I met you three days ago, idiot," Yazoo fondly said. "And we _aren't_ dating!"

"Well that's sad for you because you're madly in love with me," Reno said, pausing at the sink on his way out to wash his hands, utterly uncaring of the mess he'd left in the stall. He made his way out of the building as he continued talking to Yazoo. "Unless, of course, you showed up with a huge rock, yo! You could propose if you brought me a huge ring."

He reached Rude, who turned around curiously at the mention of the word 'propose.'

"I'm not going to propose to you, you imbecile," Yazoo sighed, breaking up as the wind hit his phone again.

"Well, maybe you should, I won't wait forever, yo," Reno informed him. "There's plenty more girls like you out there, baby, and they all want a piece of Reno."

"I imagine they do," Yazoo allowed. "However, not a one of them is like me, you obnoxious twit."

"You're so in love with me," Reno grinned, leaning back on the boss's car. "It's kinda sad."

"Your idiocy is kinda sad," Yazoo shot back, but he was laughing. "And I'm not a girl, fox-face—that was a cock in your mouth, no kidding."

"Mmmm," Reno mused, sighing a little at the memory. "I gotta go, yo. Do you love me, baby?"

"Idiot," Yazoo sighed.

"That's my girl!" Reno laughed, and flipped his phone closed, dropping it in his pocket.


	13. Mother Lost

**Thank you again to my reviewers, I hope you can wade through this rather epic story that I've developed--you have my sincerest apologies, I very rarely write anything over nine chapters. However, I just can't seem to stop.**

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The three brothers slogged through the snow, bent against the whipping wind and the flurries of the falling blanket of haze. Snow coated them, turning their silver hair white and dampening their leather clothing, leaving them shivering and unhappy but still determined to press on. They were almost at the heart of it, at a place dimly, resentfully recalled by Sephiroth. Occasionally they would pass a blasted crevice that stirred a vague sense of déjà vu, the baby seemingly most affected by it.

Yazoo peered at his littler brother again, at the slim body bent against the blowing wind, his little arms crossed painfully across his chest. The baby had been silent for the last two days, his thoughts turned inwards. He'd sought Loz more often than Yazoo for comfort, curling up mute and wide of eye in his big brother's lap. Yazoo had a feeling it had something to do with Cloud, and wondered if his little brother was feeling as strangely lost as he was. He sensed that Kadaj was somehow pining for Cloud, and pitied his little brother despite the sharp, ugly spike of jealousy he felt—for he, too, was pining, though it was hard for him to admit it. As much as he ridiculed that asinine drunkard, he certainly _did_ miss him, and had been quietly elated when Reno had called him, though it had been a task to speak with him on the phone privately while riding next to his brothers hell-bent for the Northern Crater.

Kadaj stumbled ahead of him and Yazoo looked back at Loz, tipping his head at the baby.

"Na, _koishii_," Loz said, slogging ahead to lift his little brother up. For all his large size and unintentional strength, Loz could be quite gentle and was never more gentle than when handling his precious little _koishii_. "Let me lead the way for awhile."

Kadaj seemed on the verge of protest but subsided without comment, unusually introspective. His feline green eyes flicked to Yazoo and quickly away, his slim body tightening as if Yazoo had scolded him.

Yazoo let Loz plod ahead, clearing a path for them, and fell back to gently cup Kadaj's pink ears in his gloved palms.

"Are you freezing, _koishii_?" he murmured, Kadaj nodding in his hands, though his eyes never met his brother's. "Such good behavior, I don't know what to make of it."

Kadaj shivered, slowly lifting his green eyes to meet Yazoo's. The uncertainty Yazoo saw there made him want to grab Kadaj and Loz and just run, to leave behind this madness and live somewhere peaceful where the baby would have a chance to be a child and he would have a chance to be _Yazoo_, and Loz could love however many lovely women he wanted and discuss philosophy until his tongue went numb.

"I…" Kadaj started, and paused, his pink baby lips parted and his brows drawn.

"Sh, Kadaj," Yazoo crooned, folding his little brother against him, embracing that slender, shivering body.

"I can't tell," the baby whispered, and sounded genuinely frightened, which genuinely frightened Yazoo as _nothing_ scared Kadaj. Helplessly, the baby cried, "I can't tell if it's _me_ or if it's _him_…"

Sephiroth. So roused inside the baby that he was blending the distinction between them, no doubt adding to Kadaj's already considerable madness.

"Is it what _I_ feel for him or what _Sephiroth_ feels?" Kadaj said, shaking so hard he was sure to break into pieces. He grasped Yazoo desperately and said in a rush, "He can be with us, can't he? He's just another brother—there's no reason to be jealous, we can be together once we find mother and then…and then…"

Yazoo ached for him, watching the conclusion dawn on his soft baby face. And then Sephiroth would return and he would certainly not suffer his beloved Cloud to be loved by the likes of Kadaj…if there even _was_ a Kadaj anymore. No more Kadaj, no more Yazoo, no more Loz—just Sephiroth reborn.

"It isn't _fair_," the baby whimpered, though he knew as well as his brothers that 'fair' was a child's word, something that applied only in games. He sobbed once harshly in Yazoo's embrace and said with a tinge of hysterical amusement, "I'm losing myself, Yazoo—I don't know what _love_ means, I only understand it as _he_ understood it and I know him too well to think it was real."

"The only love you need to worry yourself with is _our_ love, _koishii_," Yazoo soothed, kissing his wet forehead. "Loz and I love you to distraction and we would never, _never_ let anything harm you if we could stop it."

Kadaj nodded, so subdued that Yazoo was taking alarm.

"But he makes me ache inside," Kadaj whispered, his hand pressing in a fist over his little chest. "And I don't understand _why_…"

"We aren't meant to understand it, _koishii_," Yazoo said, pained. His little brother, who had never loved him, who had never loved Loz—never loved those dedicated to his safety and happiness, was in love for the first time in his brief life with someone who could never understand or accept him.

"What was that?" Kadaj suddenly asked, stark panic chasing everything else from his face.

"It can't be," Yazoo breathed, his stomach sinking. But the sound was too distinctive to be anything but a helicopter coming in. "They weren't supposed to be here for another two days!"

"Come on!" Kadaj hissed, tearing down the path Loz had plowed out, quickly catching up with the bigger man.

Yazoo chased after him, running blind in the haze of snow, tracking Kadaj by the quick little pants of his breath, Loz running lightly beside him. He felt the snow stir and saw the dark, smoky blurs rolling up through the ground as Kadaj called the Shadow Creepers to protect their Mother's remains.

"Hurry!" He breathed in a whisper, watching those beautiful, deadly creatures tear off over the snow, shrieking their terrible hunting calls.

They reached the epicenter, Yazoo and Loz drawing their weapons. In the whipping wind they could see Kadaj springing to attack, the _souba_ drawn and his little face fierce.

There were two of them, a tall man and a slim, small woman. Both of them had guns drawn and aimed at the baby.

"No!" Yazoo snarled, enraged even though he knew very little could hurt Kadaj. He fired off shots in quick succession, the woman flailing in the heavy snow and wailing, "Reno! _Hurry_!"

"What the hell was that?" the man shouted, unable to see through the snow, only able to make out the flashes of movement as Kadaj closed in on him, intent on his cargo.

Loz fired at him, hitting him in the shoulder as that woman struggled to stand up.

The Shadow Creepers pinned them, flooding out to scour the area. Yazoo could see the crusted, frozen thing in the tall man's arms and knew instinctively that it was Mother.

Kadaj struck swiftly, slicing through the man's parka as the helicopter swung low, kicking up a whirlwind of snow and making it impossible to see. It was a near thing, the _souba_'s slender blades thrown off by the draft of the helicopter dipping low, not connecting in a killing blow though it staggered the tall man and wounded him.

Yazoo hissed and aimed at the man's back, seeing him move towards the hovering copter and heft something inside. Loz shot the woman, who groaned and fell down in a pile of fur and blood.

"Elena!" the man cried, going back for her even as Kadaj cut him swiftly down. A shadowy figure inside the helicopter moved, perhaps with Mother's remains.

"G…go!" the woman panted, weakening quickly. "Go!"

The copter lifted, nearly dumping out the shadowy form at its open door, and quickly gained the skies, vanishing into the snow.

"No!" Kadaj shrieked, and kicked the downed man in a fit of anger, tears of rage spilling from his feline eyes. "No, no, _no_!"

"Mother!" Loz wailed, sobbing openly, falling to his knees next to the woman's feebly moving body.

For a split second that would remain Yazoo's most closely guarded secret, the young man breathed a sigh of relief that Reno had, in fact, stayed on the helicopter—and beneath that relief was the faintest stirrings of something warm and utterly alien.

Shaking the thought away, burying it along with the rest of his secret heart, Yazoo swiftly moved to start staunching the wounds on the woman, snapping at Loz to tend the man.

Kadaj seethed and screamed, beside himself at how close they'd been.

"It's going to be okay, _koishii_," Yazoo said, easily healing the woman and trussing her up. One of the Shadow Creepers slithered up and Yazoo dispersed them, saving the energy. "They sent it somewhere, and these two know where."

"_They_ won't tell us anything," Kadaj said, disgusted.

Yazoo looked at the man, healed now and alert to every move made near the small, young woman. Smiling a little with knowing, Yazoo flicked his eyes at his brother's hazy, indistinct form and said, "I think they will, a little at least. Come on, let's get them back."

"Where to?" Loz asked, easily hefting the man's body across his shoulders.

"The Forgotten City near Midgar," Kadaj said, suddenly calm in his own mad way. "No one will look for them there."

"It's near enough," Yazoo said, thinking of the town where he met Reno. "The Turk I met is from a city near there—ShinRa must be close, and so must Mother."

"I _will_ find her!" Kadaj hissed, aiming a cruel kick to the woman's head. "We'll find out what we can from these two and go from there."

Yazoo hefted the woman's small body in his arms and, catching Kadaj's eye, glanced meaningfully at the dark-haired man over Loz's shoulders.

Kadaj smiled his slow, cruel, utterly Sephiroth smile and whispered, "Loz…wanna _play_?"


	14. The Least Cloud Can Do

_Three days, three days, three days_…

The thought played over and over in Cloud's head as he made his way into Seventh Heaven. Three days ago he'd had that child beneath him. Three days ago he'd broken every promise he'd ever made to himself. Three days ago he'd unleashed the beast he'd been hiding for so long.

Three days ago he'd felt more whole than he ever had in his life.

Carrying his soiled bedroll, Cloud moved cautiously up to his office where his simple twin bed was located along with his spare clothes and parts for the _Fenrir_. The last thing he wanted was for Tifa to be alerted to his presence, not with the incriminating evidence of his defection bundled in his arms. He'd tried to rinse it out but the light stain of blood mixed in with his cum had indelibly marked his bedding, mocking him each time he tried to rest.

He dumped the bedding down on his mattress and quickly stripped, deciding to wash it all—his pants were stained, he'd never removed them during his heat for that kid. With quick, light movements he yanked on a loose pair of pants and a long-sleeved zip-up to hide the stigma in case anyone woke up during his brief visit. Scooping everything up, he padded downstairs on his bare toes like a lithe cat, alert to any sign of movement from Tifa's end of the hall upstairs.

The mudroom off of the bar had a small washing machine, and Cloud felt a strange sadness to see one of Marlene's lacy socks lying forgotten next to the dryer. He missed the kids, he really did, but their innocence burned him—it reminded him of what he had never been.

Shaking his head a little, Cloud quickly dumped his clothes and bedding into the washer and ran it, carrying his gloves back to sit at the empty, still bar. He'd nabbed Tifa's leather cleaner from the mudroom and intended to clean his soiled gloves, soft cloth in hand.

The right glove was crusted with the flaking remnants of that boy's cum, dried stiff and shiny on the dark leather. Cloud stared at it in mingled revulsion and attraction, recalling what terrible things he'd done to that heated, willing body. Feline jade eyes flashed in his memory, a pink mouth full and soft as a woman's curving into a smile of bliss. The memory made him shudder and he quickly suppressed it, feeling the blood rush to his groin.

With a scowl of irritation at himself, Cloud set to work cleaning his gloves, methodically working the leather until it shone, removing all traces of that boy…that boy whom he couldn't get out of his head…

Cloud sighed and laid the gloves aside, resting his head on his crossed arms. Would he never be free of this longing? Would he live the rest of his long, long life always having to fight it down? Was it the ghost of Sephiroth inside that child that seduced him? Or was it something _more_…

He heard a creak on the stair and lifted his head, seeing Tifa's slender, bare feet as she descended. Cloud shifted uncomfortably, already tensing for the questions to come, the gentle recriminations at his abandonment of the one he'd once sworn to play hero to so long ago.

She peered curiously down at the shadowy far end of the bar and smiled a little at him, gently pushing her black hair back behind one ear. She was dressed for bed in a simple shift that left most of her long legs bare and did nothing to disguise the heavy swell of her breasts.

Cloud realized he was looking at her with detached assessment and immediately felt awful that the sight of Tifa so enticingly presented did not stir even the faintest of his desires. He knew he was envied, knew men stared at her in stark hunger and would maim or pay good money to see her in such a state of undress…so why didn't he feel anything? It wasn't her gender, Cloud had loved women before Sephiroth—albeit with the shyness of youth—and after the first time he'd killed him Cloud had lost himself in woman after woman in an attempt to erase the man's touch. It wasn't man or woman, young or old that drew him…it was just that he'd stopped thinking of Tifa that way a long time ago, his crush evaporating as true passion had replaced puppy-love.

"Are you doing laundry?" she asked, smiling gently at him and sitting next to him at the bar, idly arranging his leather gloves.

"I didn't mean to wake you," Cloud said, staring down at the polished wood of the bar.

"The pipes," she said, and laughed a little. "Every time someone runs any taps down here, the pipes make noise."

Cloud said nothing, tilting his head a little to look at her from the corners of his lowered eyes.

"It's been awhile," Tifa murmured. "Cloud I…I'm sorry if I offended you the last time you came to the bar."

"Tifa…" Cloud began, denying her supposition.

"I didn't mean to," she quickly cut in, giving him an earnest look. She softly turned her body and leaned towards him, trying to make him meet her eyes. "I know you loved her—I know. She died, and that's terrible, and there's nothing you could do to stop it and I know _that_ hurts you too, but…"

She sighed, trying to put her thoughts into words.

"She's gone, Cloud," she finally said. "But Denzel, Marlene and I, _we're_ still here. Don't you see how much we care for you? I…I know it will take as long as it takes to come to terms with what you're feeling, but let it go, Cloud. For your sake and ours, let _her_ go…"

"I…Tifa, I…I'm sorry," Cloud sighed, head dropping lower in shame. He did mourn Aerith, yes, and Zack as well, along with all the others his lover had murdered in his madness and spite. The guilt would never leave him and that strangely comforted him, knowing that while everything changed around him at least _that_ he would always have. "I shouldn't have gone upstairs with you…I didn't mean to hurt you."

"You didn't _hurt_ me, Cloud," Tifa said, sounding a little frustrated. Enough that Cloud looked uncertainly at her. She heaved a sigh and propped her chin in her hands, at a loss as to how to deal with him. "You didn't _hurt_ me, you just made me feel…_less_ somehow."

She turned to him, her brown eyes shining and dark and deep. Cloud stared at them, searching for jade green, searching for slit pupils, searching for _anything_ before he dropped his gaze again.

"I'm not enough for you, Cloud Strife," Tifa softly murmured, saddened, her hair falling over her shoulder as she bowed her head. "There's something you're searching for and it isn't me…only what you're searching for died a long time ago…"

For a heart-stopping moment he thought she meant Sephiroth, until her soft voice continued, "Aerith wouldn't want you to give up your life and happiness for her memory, that isn't how she was. This searching for her, Cloud—you won't find her until you, too, are dead. Will you wait so long? Will you find her before you're supposed to? Or will you wait and let other happiness fill your heart?"

Cloud didn't know how to answer her. He'd spent so long in a growing cocoon of joyless existence that he wasn't sure he could _be_ any other way…

Except when that half-grown, foul-mouthed kid had him in thrall. What he'd felt in the chapel had been akin to forgiveness—that same relief, that same overwhelming release of pain and denial. Was there something more to that boy? He was mad, Cloud knew it, speaking as he did about Sephiroth, but so far had offered no threat. And the self-loathing Cloud had felt after using that slim, toned body so thoroughly was the loathing of a man who had misused something precious. He didn't know that child who called him "big brother," didn't know anything about his life but that it must not have been an easy one—the kid carried a sword to make Sephiroth proud, moved in battle with the instinctual ease of someone long used to being attacked and fighting back, and could do things with his young body that no child his age should have mastered. When he thought of how he'd wrenched that delicate head around by that silky hair, Cloud felt an overwhelming shame at his own actions. That boy had never known love, not a day in his young life—he only knew that fucking made him feel good and pain could add to that pleasure. Did no one kiss him like they'd die without his touch? Did no one touch him tenderly and tell him he was beautiful? Had he only known hard hands and cruel attention? These thoughts bothered Cloud, bothered him badly because he'd been just one of those people to use that boy for his own selfish enjoyment…

The washer intervened, much to Cloud's relief, spinning to a stop that the ever-alert and helpful Tifa noticed. She was off of the stool in a heartbeat, quickly stuffing his laundry into the dryer before coming back.

"I don't know what's wrong with me," Cloud whispered, trembling a little when he knew it to be true. "I…Tifa, I've done such terrible things…you can't understand…Even now I'm not safe to be near."

He looked up at her, straight into her large, understanding eyes. Such patience his Tifa had, the staunch willingness to wait until time or circumstance changed things in her favor.

"I _will_ hurt you, Tifa," he lowly said, his voice thick with emotion. "The last thing I want to do is expose you to this…this…_monster_ inside me."

"You're no monster, Cloud," Tifa said, reaching out to cup his cheek, ignoring the way he tensed, ignoring the animal-like way he shied from her touch. "Every bit of you is beautiful to me…That's what it means to…to care about someone."

Cloud's mouth tightened in self-reproach. He was frustrated that he couldn't communicate to Tifa what he really _was_. She refused to understand it, was content to wear the blinders and think of him as the hero she loved. And every time he tried to make her understand, he ended up bruising her ego—luckily, it wasn't anything else. Their friendship had lasted this long at her insistence, at her persistent determination to keep Cloud grounded in reality and a part of the world around him. He was grateful to her for her efforts, grateful to have an anchor he could always rely on, and in that gratitude he could not give her what she wanted. Because what she wanted might rouse that monster inside him, and then Tifa would be gone, overcome by her fear and disgust…gone like Aerith, gone like Zack, gone like Sephiroth—all of them leaving him, someway, somehow.

'_I will never leave you…whatever you may think of me, however you may hate yourself, we are _brothers_…_'

Realizing he'd been silent after her admission—so close to a declaration of love, so near to what Tifa could never admit from her shyness with him—Cloud felt even worse. The sad, raw look in her eyes burned him, acid on a heart already shredded into pieces.

"Tifa…" he sighed, moving awkwardly to touch her. He'd never been able to touch her easily. When he was young he'd been too awe-struck by her beauty, and in the last few years since his escape from ShinRa's clutches he'd refrained from respect for her and a loss of the desire to do so. But her hair was soft as a kitten's fur beneath the hesitant brush of his fingers, and she closed her eyes a little, holding her breath as if any second Cloud might pull away, might leave her as he had so many times before. "I'm sorry for everything…"

He decided then that he would do this one selfless thing to take the bewildered hurt out of her eyes.

He would do this for Tifa.

He would give her what she wanted and hope that it would satisfy her, because Cloud could not add to the guilt that already plagued him. He could not intentionally wound the woman who had helped him through the hardest parts of his life. God help him if he couldn't keep the beast at bay when she was in his arms. Cloud wasn't sure he could live with himself if Tifa ever turned from him.

He let his hand fall from her hair to her creamy white shoulder, unconsciously comparing her skin to that boy's, longing for him in a way that unsettled him. Tifa looked at him with a mixture of hope and disbelief, a look that once again tore at his heart. He'd gone so long blind to her pain, blind to _everything_, and though he knew nothing more would come of this than a night, he hoped it would be enough for her to salvage her pride and move on to someone who deserved her fierce loyalty and undying devotion.

Moving in silence, Cloud stood and scooped her up, holding her easily, closing his eyes briefly when she curled against his chest and buried her face in the crook of his neck, her warm tears wetting his skin and her capable hands clutching his shoulders.

'_I will do this for you, Tifa, because you are my friend and I love you_,' he thought, carrying her up to her room. '_I can only give you one night, but what I have is yours to take_.'

It was the least he could do for her, and it was, possibly, far too little, but Cloud was prepared to try.

If only that boy would stay in his memories, if only he wouldn't see jade green eyes in a soft, childish face. If only he wouldn't recall the rhythm and taste of that slender, muscled body.

If only he wasn't already well on his way to feeling for him what Tifa so desperately wanted him to feel for her.


	15. Decisions Decisions

"Get rid of them, we've gotten about all we will out of _these_ two," Kadaj said, smirking at the bloody, shuddering masses of what had been Tseng and Elena. Weakened by dehydration and lightened from starvation, the two were skeletal horrors, so terrorized by what had been done to them that coherence wasn't even an option.

Loz grinned and hefted both bodies, one under each arm, hauling them further into the eerily glowing forest.

Yazoo flicked a bit of bloody skin off of his fingers with a soft wrinkle of his delicate nose. Of the three of them Yazoo was most fastidious, disliking the blood speckled over his skin and mingling in the darkness of his coat. He looked a mess, and Kadaj certainly did.

"Let's spend the night in town," Kadaj purred. "I want to clean this shit off of me and there's really no hurry. If it is as the man finally admitted, then Mother has gone to Edge and will not be moving for awhile. _He's_ not so frantic now, so maybe I can rest."

He meant what he said, the oppressive, impulsive presence of Sephiroth somehow lessened by the information their tortures had prized forth. The boy was, after all, still a boy and found that the loss of Sephiroth's driving desire left a gaping hole of doubt and strain inside him. His thoughts turned more and more to Cloud, tinged in the bitter understanding that if Sephiroth's plans went as he wanted then Kadaj would never find himself at the not-so-tender mercy of his brother again.

"Kadaj?" Yazoo inquired, looking at him with those cool, sultry eyes now tinged with the tiniest bit of worry. His Yazoo, who had proven his love with such fury the very first time they'd joined, and had retreated behind an impenetrable wall of reticence after Kadaj had slain his first lover. His Yazoo, who wasn't his anymore, but whom he still needed so very, very badly. "_Koishii_, what is it? You look so…"

"It's nothing!" Kadaj snapped, frightened by how much he needed his brothers, terrified once more that the people of this world would somehow seduce them away from him, leading him to greater and greater acts of desperation to keep them near.

He saw that coolness cover the concern in Yazoo's eyes and mourned its loss, his emotions in such chaos that he found himself laughing one moment and crying the next. It was worse than insanity. Kadaj had an inkling that it might be _love_.

"You'll never leave me, will you, Yazoo?" Kadaj asked, suddenly shaken in his faith.

"I will never leave you, Kadaj," Yazoo intoned, his voice neutral and his face empty. He, Kadaj, had forced that emptiness there. His jealousy and possessiveness had driven his brother to take shelter in distance, setting him away, keeping him at arm's length just for room enough to breathe.

Would Cloud do the same? Would he have patience with Kadaj's fits? Would he abandon Kadaj at the first sign of his madness? If Kadaj threw himself down at Cloud's feet right now and abandoned Sephiroth's plan, would Cloud even care?

'_He would laugh_,' that voice whispered—evil, cruel voice that always taunted him, always crushed him. What he thought was Mother's voice, though sometimes it seemed it was Sephiroth's. '_He would laugh at how pathetic you are and leave you where you lay…He's already laughing, Kadaj, my little prince. He went straight to another lover's arms and erased the taste of you out of disgust…_'

Kadaj flinched, the thought angering him. He wished those two were still near so he had something to hurt…He didn't _want_ to believe it, but he knew it was true. Cloud had no ties to him, no reason to think he was anything other than an insane, misguided child with a penchant for rough sex. They shared no connection beyond Mother's genes and a common thread with Sephiroth. Kadaj was an infant in the face of love, and Cloud was a seasoned player of the game—there was nothing in him, no redeeming factor, no quality that would turn Cloud to him. Cloud wanted _Sephiroth_…they _all_ did.

"No!" Kadaj moaned, fisting his hands in his hair and doubling over, teeth clenched. He screamed and tore at his hair as if he could rip those cruel thoughts out along with the shining silver strands. "_No no no no no no noooooooooo_!"

Yazoo watched him, impassive in the face of his suffering, understanding him but unable to comfort him. Finally, when Kadaj stopped screaming and stood sobbing, his scalp bleeding and his body shivering, Yazoo moved smoothly to him and held him fast.

"Hush, now, _koishii_," he soothed, rocking Kadaj, and the boy was abjectly grateful to feel it, clinging to his older brother in horror. A whole world of life laid out before him, and he would hand it over to Sephiroth for the sake of the other's ambition.

'_Don't you understand yet, my little prince_?' that voice questioned, as merciless and amused as ever. '_We are _one_, Kadaj. There is no movement you make that is not first made by me. There is no word uttered from your lips that has not first fallen from mine. Even the merest twitch of your eyelid is because _I_ have willed it. You are a puppet, my dear, mad little creature. But you are unfit to live out my legacy—only _He_ can bring me true happiness…_'

Kadaj sobbed hard against Yazoo's shoulder and tearfully whimpered, "_Mother_…"

And on the heels of that, a child's promise rose from the tiny portion of his heart that was tender and safe, still innocent enough to believe in happiness, still naïve enough to have faith that all would be well.

'_If he tells me not to, I won't do it. If he tells me not to, then maybe he cares for me, and that's worth anything…_'


	16. Of Madness and Despair

Yazoo waited until Kadaj was in the shower before he slipped out of their room and down the stairs to place his call. Kadaj, in the way of all little brothers, was incessantly nosy—on top of his being jealous, possessive, and insane, making it imperative that Yazoo seek privacy to contact the man who had occupied so much of his thoughts these past weeks.

Reno had called him twice since their little tussle; once to jerk off and once to tell his voicemail that he was currently stuck in place while his helicopter was being repaired. Apparently several of his and Loz's shots had hit home, blowing holes in the bird and destroying some of its vital wiring.

Yazoo very rarely placed calls, and only to his brothers when they were out of earshot and he had something he needed to tell them that the emotive nature of their connection could not convey.

The line rang only three times before it was answered in the usual casual and, to Yazoo's sensitive etiquette, almost rude way.

"What it is, yo? How's my favorite girlfriend doing?"

"Better now to be back in civilization, thank you," Yazoo said, feeling as if he sounded so formal beside Reno's slangy, lazy manner of speaking. But then, Yazoo and his brothers had been educated to a frightening extent in their few short years of life, and the person Yazoo emulated had been a doctor of the highest education and social caliber. "Are you still coddling that machine of yours?"

"Yeah, just got the parts in. Dunno why the boss thinks I need to baby-sit it, but rich people are kooks about the things they spend their money on," Reno said, sounding put out by the whole situation. "Where are you, baby? Long time, no call, yo."

Yazoo told him, smiling a little when the man sighed in relief and said, "Thank _god_! I've been horny as _fuck_!"

"What makes you think I'll sleep with you, you arrogant ass?" Yazoo teased, leaning against the wall in the darkened hallway, smiling a smile his brothers had never seen because it was unguarded, utterly open, and genuinely happy.

"I'm Reno, baby," the Turk said, as if this were explanation enough. "_Everybody_ wants to sleep with me."

"Hmph," Yazoo primly replied. "Well, I'm only in for the night."

"Lame," Reno decided. "Fine, meet me at our bar tonight at seven and we'll binge again, yo. At least I know you can hold your alcohol, right, lady?"

"I'm not a girl!" Yazoo scolded, as much amused as he was exasperated.

"Can't prove it," Reno quipped. "Seven it is. Love me, baby?"

"Go fuck yourself," Yazoo sighed.

"I love you, too," Reno said, laughing. "It's okay, you can tell me you love me. We've been dating for, like, six months or something, yo."

"I met you less than a month ago, you idiot!" Yazoo hissed, trying not to laugh as it only encouraged him. "Are you _always_ drunk? And we aren't dating!"

"Says _you_. See you at seven, baby—I'm out, yo."

Yazoo flipped his phone closed and lingered in the hallway, letting his shroud of cool disdain settle back around him before he went up to face Kadaj. He wasn't too worried about his little brother missing him this evening—_koishii_ was restless and moody, hardly responding to either of his brothers since his fit in the forest. He had pulled into himself, his feline eyes moiling with puzzlement and hurt, an occasional word escaping him as he challenged the voices in his head.

Loz was in the shower when he got back, humming enthusiastically—if a little off-key—and generally enjoying himself. His larger brother's ability to always be happy sometimes made Yazoo envious, but then he'd see Loz fall to tears at something as benign as Kadaj's scowl or a tear in his leather suit and the envy would vanish into vast relief. At least he had stability, and it was a virtue both of his brothers relied heavily on.

The baby was sitting naked and cross-legged on the bed, so closed down that Yazoo couldn't even sense him. The fits had gotten worse, as had the general subject matter of his internal dialogue—whatever that voice was, be it Mother or Sephiroth or god himself, Yazoo felt like slapping it silly. From what he could piece together of Kadaj's body language and fierce hisses, he knew that those voices were not particularly kind to his baby brother. Despite that Kadaj hadn't been a child even _as_ a child, Yazoo still felt protective of him, and he loved him dearly. Anything that caused his _koishii_ misery did not deserve to exist—period.

"You're dripping wet, _koishii_," Yazoo realized, and plucked up the towel to gently rough the water out of Kadaj's silky hair. The baby swayed with the movement but didn't respond. Wanting to baby him, wanting to touch him and let him know that he wasn't alone, Yazoo fetched his comb from his bag and sat behind him, gently combing his thick, fine hair.

The baby moved once during it, drawing his knees to his chest and hugging them, so little and forlorn that Yazoo ached to see him smile. Even the cruel, cold Sephiroth smile would be welcomed.

"Whatever they're saying to you that is so unkind, Kadaj, please don't believe them," Yazoo breathed, tossing the comb down to wrap his arms around his brother's slender shoulders, dropping soft kisses on his sweet skin. "We love you, little tyrant. We always will."

"No one can love me," Kadaj whispered, his voice so soft even Yazoo had difficulty hearing it. The baby shivered, from horror or from chill, and his older brother squeezed him tight. "I'm not wanted, Yazoo. Nobody wants _me_. Nobody needs _me_. Mother doesn't need anything more from me than _him_. She doesn't love me, and I would do anything, _anything_ for her…"

"I know you would, _koishii_," Yazoo gently said, snagging the folded blanket from the end of the bed and wrapping it around Kadaj's slender, trembling form. "But Loz and I, _we_ need you. _We_ love you. I know you love Mother, Kadaj—if she cannot fathom the greatness of what you are, then perhaps…perhaps she doesn't need to ask you to sacrifice yourself for her plans."

Kadaj rocked a little, huddled in the blanket and looking all of twelve years old, his face was so lost and haunted. Very, very softly he said, "If I let _him_ come back, then she will love me, won't she? She'll _have_ to, because I'll have proved that I'm a good son."

Yazoo bit his lip, glad that Kadaj's back was to him. He'd spent long years hardening his shell against his mad, utterly fascinating little brother, and now it was all crumbling around him in the face of the baby's pain. He had fancied himself the most reserved of the three, the most skilled at hiding what he felt—but Kadaj, for all his fits and bursts of temper, for all that it seemed he wore his heart on his sleeve, had hidden a pain so deep it had cut him to the quick. He had hidden it for so long and so well that Yazoo had had only the slightest suspicion that it was there. And like a festering, septic wound it had slowly poisoned him, degrading his self-worth, corrupting his sense of self, drowning him in a deeper madness than what he'd been born with.

He embraced the baby, hugging that little body to his own, wrapping Kadaj in all the warmth and safety he could offer. Softly, vehemently, he whispered, "Don't let them destroy you, Kadaj—you are so precious to me…"

"He hurt me, you know," Kadaj murmured, shifting a little to be more fully in Yazoo's strong arms. "He hurt me inside my head, inside my heart. And every time I think of him, he hurts me again."

Yazoo had no salve for that particular wound. He knew Cloud Strife was not the type of man who would tryst with a boy like Kadaj without some kind of repercussions. He'd known all along that nothing good would come of _koishii_ seeking him out, and that the inevitable interaction would result in the baby being rejected, pushed aside. Cloud Strife was, after all, a man trying desperately to murder his own soul—even the simple release of sex would scorch such a man into anger and denial. And the baby, who had only an inkling of _conscience_, who didn't understand such things as willpower, who had virtually no impulse control, could only be bewildered and angered by such a reaction.

Loz emerged from the bathroom then, merrily toweling his hair. He'd taken the time to shave his sideburns to perfection, and preened when Yazoo smiled at him. The bigger man, however, honed in on the baby curled up in Yazoo's arms and paused a moment, torn between sibling jealousy and his loyal impulse to comfort his precious _koishii_. Loyalty and rivalry combined and Loz scooped Kadaj up, blanket and all, to rock him on his own bed, shooting Yazoo a smirking, triumphant look. Yazoo didn't indulge the smile that he felt inside at Loz's childish games—it had been so ever since Kadaj had first been brought to them as a tiny toddler. They had bickered and fought like territorial dogs over who got to hold him, who got to bathe him, who got to rock him to sleep, though inevitably whenever one got the baby, the other immediately got jealous that the littlest was getting all of the attention and stirred up a ruckus, starting the whole mess over again.

Yazoo left them together and quickly showered, feeling rather like a bastard at his excitement, considering his baby brother was on the verge of a break-down. But then, it always was Loz the baby wanted when he needed gentle comfort, when he needed the security of strength. Yazoo's comfort was of a less gentle type, something sought when Kadaj was frightened that he was, somehow, slipping from their thoughts and hearts. It was violence he wanted then, confirmation that he was _alive_, that he was still enough a part of this world to experience pain and his brother's somewhat cruel love.

Refreshed, Yazoo rinsed out his leather outfit and left it to dry, knowing that wear would make it supple once again. He had an identical outfit in his bag and dressed in it quickly, smiling a little with affection to see Kadaj sound asleep in Loz's lap, the bigger man half-asleep himself and partially slumped over the baby's body. Taking a moment, Yazoo gently roused Loz enough to get him under the covers and take his damp towel away before tucking Kadaj to his large, capable chest, spreading the baby's blanket over them both. He knew they wouldn't sleep the night, but Loz was a sleeper by nature and Kadaj was worn thin by the fighting in his mind—they would pass a few hours yet in rest.

He made it to the bar by six fifty and ordered a drink, smiling tightly at the bartender, who obviously remembered him. Two drinks and an hour later Yazoo had still seen no sign of Reno. He was about to leave, feeling more angry and hurt than he could ever recall, when his phone rang. It was Reno saying he'd been stuck working but would be right there.

By eight-thirty Yazoo was pretty buzzed and as desperately disappointed as he could be. The first time he'd ever returned to a lover, and that lover couldn't be bothered to see him. It galled him and embarrassed him, reminding him of why he'd built the walls he'd so carefully guarded all of these years.

He finally overcame his fear of seeming intrusive and called Reno, only to get kicked straight to voice-mail.

So.

His phone was off.

"I hate to mention it, but aren't you the man Reno was hitting on last month?" the bartender finally asked, clearly dying to ask for the last few hours Yazoo had been at the bar.

Yazoo nodded shortly, sipping his drink.

"He seemed to think you were a woman, if I remember correctly."

"He's an idiot," Yazoo shortly said, not really interested in discussing his fox-faced, duplicitous lover. "I disabused him of that notion rather quickly."

"Yeah," the bartender laughed, merrily refilling Yazoo's drink when it was empty. "He was just in here a few hours ago, it's too bad you missed him."

"_Really_?" Yazoo said, brows rising in time with his temper. "Now that _is_ interesting. Here, you say?"

"Uh, yeah, like an hour before you got here," the man said, talking easily, clearly sensing nothing amiss, so Yazoo's façade must be firmly in place. "Said he had to go pick up some guy named Rude. Looks like you turned our little womanizer into a man-eater!"

He laughed at his own joke and Yazoo smiled coolly, not sharing his mirth.

"Yes, well, Reno will be the first to admit that he gets around," Yazoo said, forking out some cash onto the bar, privately proud that his hands weren't shaking. "Do me a favor, will you? If he comes back in tonight, don't tell him you said anything to me. I wouldn't want him thinking I was prying."

"No problem!" the bartender said, pleased with his tip. He smiled at Yazoo and added, "You can do way better than that beaten-down assassin, you know. Good looking guy like you shouldn't waste your time."

"You're absolutely right," Yazoo said.

He made his way back to the hotel, undressed, and managed to squeeze into the bed with his brothers, shivering with cold despair and silently mourning the loss of something that had never been, and now never would be.

* * *

Reno was beside himself, nearly wearing a trench in the floor with his restless pacing.

Rude watched him stalk back and forth, back and forth until the sight made him dizzy. Usually his lazy, laid-back partner would be draped over one of the chairs or in the bathroom performing obscene acts in the not-so-private stalls. That he was moving at all was a miracle, considering he'd emptied his flask once, surreptitiously refilled it from the liquor cabinet behind them, and emptied it again—the fact that he was virtually _seething_ made Rude ever so slightly interested. He'd never seen Reno _seethe_ before. Temper just wasn't something that suited the easy-going, rather impudent little shit.

And had Rude seen a lot of temper from Reno in the last few hours! It had started when he got called away from his bar where he was, apparently, to meet a girlfriend of his and it had only accelerated when he was held at work, prompting an apologetic phone call and a mistakenly optimistic promise to meet her half an hour later. When it was clear he wouldn't make it, he'd tried to call her back only to find that his phone had died in his pocket. His charger had been back in his room with the small amount of luggage Rufus had sent to tide him over, and the fact that he couldn't leave his duty had gotten him into a near mouth-frothing rage. It seemed nothing had gone right for his amusingly oafish partner this evening…

"I have got to _go_, yo!" he said for the thousandth time, pausing to check Rude's watch _again_ because he refused to wear one of his own.

Rufus had surprised Reno at the end of the day by arriving _en entourage_ and demanding a status report that took hours. Now he was taking his sweet time discussing the capabilities of the helicopter with the mechanics as if he actually gave a shit, pretending interest in things that he felt he _should_ have an interest in.

"And just what is more important than ShinRa business that you have to get to?" Rufus asked, wheeling in from the hangar to the officer lounge, clearly overhearing Reno's not so quiet statement.

Reno scowled at him. As much as he respected his boss he was too edgy and _far_ too sober to deal with Rufus' biting remarks.

"Reno, inebriation and sexual deviancy are not justifiable reasons for leaving your place of duty," Rufus said, smug. He loved pushing Reno's buttons and, boy-howdy, was he pushing them. "Now, the helicopter is refurbished and the upgrades are complete, let's get back to Edge."

"But sir—"

"Reno!" Rufus snapped, holding his covering shroud close to his cheek. "You have your orders! Rude, drive us back to the hotel to collect Reno's things and then we will leave."

Reno scowled but could do nothing, only hope that when he finally got his phone charged Yazoo would still accept his calls. He knew _he_ wouldn't, if the shoe were on the other foot. And it would take time to get the 'copter back to the airfield in Edge, more time to return Rufus to his lodge, and even longer to make it _back_—should he even get the chance to slip his leash! Even to him his excuses sounded lame, and he knew they were valid. The thought of Yazoo—beautiful, sensual, utterly enigmatic Yazoo—waiting and waiting on him made him feel like the lowest of the low. Reno was not generally someone who concerned himself with _others_, but Yazoo was different.

Yazoo was special.

And Reno had the sinking, ugly feeling that he'd seen the last of his wild, enchanting lover.


	17. No More Truce

By the time he and his brothers reached the furthest borders of Edge, Kadaj's voices had worked the ultimate destructive magic. Not only had the boy been convinced of his own unworthiness, he now firmly believed that what had happened with Cloud had been some kind of cruel joke at his expense—and that was the beauty of a madness like Kadaj's, it cared nothing for reality, shifted memories to suit itself, and bent the facts to support the most outrageous of lies. What had started as the faintest blossom of true and deep feeling had been discovered by the voices inside him to be a threat to Sephiroth's return, and so they had steadily and methodically torn Kadaj apart until he came around to their way of thinking. Now there was just the slightest sliver of that feeling left, guarded jealously by Kadaj's most secret self, and the rest had turned to rot.

He had loved Cloud, he knew it, and his secret heart still felt it. Being an impulsive and wild creature had made him ripe to fall fast and hard for the myriad charms of his eldest brother. He had loved Cloud dearly, and it was so terribly, terribly hard to keep the bitterness and pain under control when he was reminded that Cloud could never love him, unlovable as he was. That Cloud would never chose Kadaj over Sephiroth, never willingly hold his slender body or want to kiss his lips. Indeed, those voices had told him that Cloud had only allowed it to happen because Kadaj reminded him of Sephiroth, and what better way to ensure that the man returned than to satiate and flatter the boy who housed him? And even though the part of him that loved Cloud screamed that it was a lie, that his big brother would never stoop to such duplicitous behavior, Kadaj's madness had too long worked on his own view of himself, and he accepted every word as gospel.

He paused, Loz and Yazoo rolling up beside him. His lovely, slender elder brother had been even more uncommunicative than usual since that night they spent at the inn. A peculiar air of melancholy seemed to cling to him, or perhaps it was just something Kadaj could scent on his skin—a sadness so great it escaped to pour from the body in waves.

Kadaj had felt a sort of dull surprise to find Yazoo wedged into bed with the two of them. Dull because _everything_ was dull, everything except the rage and the encompassing need to find Mother.

Yazoo had not said more than monosyllables since waking next to them. And when Kadaj kissed him he could tell that something lacked in his sylph-like brother's response, and so he had left him untouched in order to deal with his own inner demons.

Just then Yazoo's phone went off, startling all three of them.

Kadaj's eyes narrowed, the sound rousing the jealous, spiteful child inside him.

"Who is _that_?" Kadaj asked, seeing his brother look at the number and somehow manage to turn even whiter. Or maybe he blanched, he looked pained and rather ill. Kadaj snatched the phone away as the caller went to voicemail and frowned at the number of missed calls Yazoo had from whoever it was. "Yazoo, who is calling you?"

"The Turk," Yazoo said, his voice even and steady, though he turned his head away, hiding his face behind his hair.

Kadaj glanced at Loz, who was scowling. Loz was even more bothered by the state of his brothers, unhappy that they were so terribly sad.

"He hurt you, Yazoo," Loz simply said.

Yazoo's slim shoulders slumped a little but he only breathed, "Yes."

"I'll _kill_ him!" Kadaj snarled, offended to the core of himself and insanely protective of his brother. He pulled his own phone out and dialed the Turk's number, realizing almost too late that his voice was too soft and childish to pull off any lies. He shoved his phone at Loz and the bigger man settled back on his bike, phone held to his ear and his head tilted back as true temper narrowed his eyes. His brothers were his babies, the dearest things he had.

Kadaj listened in malicious glee as Loz got his teeth into Yazoo's lover, giving him an ass-chewing and a half in service to Yazoo's wounded pride and damaged ego. He made a good show of being an _extremely_ irate boyfriend of five years demanding to know just _who_ has been blowing up his darling Yazoo's phone and winding up with a warning to stay far, _far_ from his delicate little blossom or else.

"No more problems from him, Yazoo," Loz said, smirking and giving Kadaj his phone back.

The boy impulsively saved the Turk's number and put his phone away before handing Yazoo his own phone back.

The man took it with a languid, graceful hand but there was nothing on his stoic face but that clinging sadness.

"Come on," Kadaj snapped, irritated now that Yazoo was not relieved they had taken care of it for him. He wouldn't even _consider_ that Yazoo might feel for the Turk what he himself had felt for Cloud. Not a _chance_.

They rode another hour until they hit the bluff that overlooked the ruin of Midgar and the town of Edge beyond, Kadaj spitefully knocking down that huge blade he'd last seen the day he'd come to Cloud so willingly.

For the first time all day Yazoo showed some vague interest in what was going on and murmured, "Hey, Kadaj. Does big brother live here?"

Kadaj only laughed a little, the madness spinning brightly in his head.

"Will he be happy to see us?" Yazoo asked, a little unsure. He had no clue how Kadaj's interactions with Cloud had gone—except badly. Still, for all he knew of Cloud, the man could very well welcome others like himself.

"Not a chance," Kadaj quickly assured him, still smiling that cruel Sephiroth smile.

"Don't cry, Yazoo," Loz quipped, smirking meanly at his slim brother, though there was only sibling spite in it, not any true malice.

"Do you think Mother is with him?" Yazoo asked. A good question, since Cloud was, after all, a delivery boy and those Turks _had_ said that Mother was being _sent_ to Edge.

Kadaj shrugged as if he didn't care, feigning indifference and saying, "Maybe not."

"Don't cry, Loz," Yazoo sighed, automatic reaction as the bigger man's face screwed up into tears.

Kadaj heard the faint whine of a motor and glanced down to see Cloud riding past them below, heading back towards the ruined city.

"Oh ho! Big Brother!" he said, smiling when his two brothers exchanged glances, in the mood for a bit of cat and mouse. He gave them a nod in Cloud's direction, permission granted from the little tyrant.

* * *

He wasn't sure just where the thought sprang from, but it occurred to Cloud that there was very little he wouldn't consider doing in order to see his little brother.

The idea of it bothered him, occupying his thoughts as he ran packages too and fro, losing himself in the steady thrum of the _Fenrir's_ motor, the miles eating up his time.

He'd given up any pretense of living at Seventh Heaven, feeling that distance was required now that he'd invaded Tifa's bed. She was understanding to a fault, accepting of the wall he'd put up between them, never bothering him with questions, only ever letting him know that when he needed her she would be there for him. Her steady affection was both a relief and a huge frustration for him, because even after he'd frightened her in bed, she still hadn't the sense enough to be afraid of him—she _trusted_ him, and Cloud had always failed the ones who trusted him…at least, as far as he was concerned.

Still, that boy…His image ran circles in Cloud's mind, arousing a gnawing, aching hunger he thought had died with Sephiroth. For the first time in years he'd had a lover, and it was a lover who matched him passion for passion, blow for blow. And beneath the throbbing need for him was something drawn by the kid's very youth, something in him that not only wanted to dominate and own that slender body, hurting the child as they both so craved, but also wanted to hold him and keep him safe against the horrors of the world. Here was the innocence of a child already marred but still needful of a child's adoration.

'_Worship me_,' even now those words made him shudder, his breathing becoming unsteady. It was an arrogant man's request, but it was also the craving of an attention-starved boy. Cloud sensed that the creature he touched so eagerly didn't care what kind of hands touched him—kind or cruel—so long as he was _seen_, so long as he was _felt_, so long as someone acknowledged that he _was_. Living as a ghost of himself for so long had taught Cloud well the feeling of being unseen, and it was unsettling when it was the path one _chose_, let alone the path one was forced to walk.

'_I will see him again_,' Cloud promised himself, leaning low over his bike on his way across the dusty flats. '_I will see him and it will be different this time. I won't be just another man to use him like a whore._'

The mundane business of the day intruded on his thoughts. Packages to be delivered, money to change hands, greetings to exchange and smiles to avoid returning. He wound up going all the way to the neighboring town, a good three hour ride away. To amuse himself he took a shortcut, avoiding the main path through the dust-bowl that passed for a road.

Business conducted, he made his way back along the usual path, pausing on the bluffs to listen to his messages—oddly enough, Reno had called the bar for him. There was no love lost between the pair of them, though neither one held a grudge, still it was rather odd for the eccentric, slip-shod Turk to try to contact him. Tifa's voice sounded strangely amused and Cloud absently wondered why. He knew she had developed a soft spot for the lanky red-head, enough to let him drink himself into mental retardation in her bar and get away with comments that would have most people out on their ass, but he was sure Tifa wouldn't actually go so far as to _befriend_ Reno. Not when he had such winning classics in his repertoire as, "Tifa, I'll give you ten gil to fuck your tits, yo." It was _Cloud_ who had tossed him out that night, deciding enough was enough. Besides, Tifa had been laughing too hard to do it herself.

Cloud flipped the phone closed and headed on his way, ready to find out what Reno wanted and get back to the chapel for another boring, lonely night spent torturing himself with memories of that boy's delicate, delicious body.

It was only when the stigma started to pain him with mad insistence that Cloud became aware that he might be in danger, and glanced around to see himself pursued by two silver-haired, jade-eyed demons with soft, pink, sphinx-like smiles.

Like lions coming in for the kill.

* * *

Kadaj let them have their fun, knowing that Cloud had enough of Mother in him that flat-out killing him would be next to impossible. He even sent their Shadow Creepers to play, knowing how much his brothers liked hunting with the fluid, frightening nightmares.

A part of him felt justified to see Cloud battling in earnest—he _deserved_ it, because he didn't love Kadaj and never would. No one loved Kadaj, not even Mother, only the voice that belonged to Sephiroth, whispering to him how wonderful everything would be, what a good child he was to resurrect him. He took comfort in that cold voice, in that impersonal cruelty.

Still, he did not really care to see Cloud truly harmed as yet—he wanted that particular pleasure for himself. So he idly flipped the phone back open and redialed the Turk, determined to find out where Mother truly was.

"What—"

"Be silent," Kadaj ordered, lifting his delicate head to check on his brothers' progress. "I know you went on a mission to the Northern Crater, and I know you took something that doesn't belong to you. We want it back."

"Who the fuck is this, yo?" the voice at the other end asked, angry and ready to snap. "Two fuckin' weirdo phone calls in one day—"

"I want Mother," Kadaj purred, eyes narrowing.

"Then go find her, baby boy, I ain't your daddy," was the sour reply. "We ain't got _nobody's_ Mother."

"You took her from the Northern Crater," Kadaj patiently said, amazed that this was the fool who had laid his precious Yazoo so low.

"I don't know what you're talking about, yo," he was told, and the other's tone was hard, tense…_lying_.

Changing tactics, Kadaj laughed lightly and said, "Don't tell me you're leading me on! Because I _do_ think that you have Mother there."

"Listen here, you little shit-head," that voice tightly said, well and truly worked up now. "_We_ haven't got anything you want, got it, yo? So get your ass back in the sandbox and do what other twelve year olds do—understood?!"

Kadaj giggled, knowing his soft, sweet voice often made him sound much younger, and the Turk's rising temper amused him. Sweetly, he laughed, "No need to shout!" He sighed, finished playing with him, and said in a much harder, much older voice, "I'm done talking to you. Put the President on."

"No w—"

A hard, low voice interrupted him from the background and there was a soft scuffle as whoever it was took the phone.

"This is the President," the voice said.

"And this is Kadaj," the boy politely replied. "You know who I am, don't you, Mr. ShinRa? I'm sure whoever that big fellow was who escaped into the helicopter told you about my brothers and myself."

"He said that there were perhaps three assailants, maybe more," that voice carefully said. "Kadaj, is it? What can I do for you, young man?"

"You can stop trying to eradicate Mother, for starters!" Kadaj flared, the madness welling up. "She wants to be reunited with her children, you monster! I know you think you've got to make amends to this hunk of rock, but I can't let that happen—I'm doing Mother's will, and I _need_ her."

"Do you know what your 'mother' is?" Rufus asked, clearly catching onto _something_. "I'm assuming you're speaking of the thing we called Jenova—"

"Mother is _not_ a thing! _She is not a thing_!" Kadaj screamed, outraged.

"We took nothing from the Northern Crater, Kadaj," Rufus told him, his neutral tone an attempt to calm the boy, even as it was screaming a lie. "We went there and were attacked by your gang, and that is the end of the story. Nothing was taken, nothing was recovered. I promise you."

Kadaj smiled a little, knowing a lie when he heard one.

"We'll see," he murmured, and hung up the phone.

He looked out at where his brothers were all playing and saw Cloud dangerously close to being eaten by the Shadow Creepers. Moving before he was even aware of it, Kadaj opened his hand and recalled them, thinking, '_Just this once, brother. This once I will let you go—consider it a warning, and know that I will never let you deceive me again..._'

He saw Loz and Yazoo peel off, returning to him, and Cloud staring up at him with bewildered anger, clearly not expecting to see his former lover atop the bluff. Kadaj settled onto his bike and kicked it into gear, unwilling to spend too long looking at that beautiful face, unable to bear up under that accusing glare.

He sped back the way they had come and met his brothers mid-way, confident that Cloud would not follow them.

Yazoo and Loz looked happier than they had in days, invigorated by the fight. Even suffering from the stigma, Cloud was a formidable opponent and they had worked at getting him trapped.

"Well, ShinRa isn't talking but I know Mother is here," Kadaj said without preamble. "Loz, you go into town and ask about Cloud—where he's been going the last few days, who he's been talking to and where his packages have been delivered. Perhaps he even _has_ kept Mother for himself. Search his things if you can."

Loz nodded shortly, a slow smirk spreading across his face.

"Yazoo, go into town and gather all of the children with the stigma you can find," Kadaj went on, his mad brain furiously working. "They have Mother's cells, don't they? We'll take them back to our camp and I'll Bind them—with Mother's cells they should be drawn to wherever she is at, so we can just follow them when they leave."

Yazoo nodded as well, not saying anything.

"I'm going to track Cloud," Kadaj murmured. "My guess is, if he has Mother on him, he'll be heading for ShinRa."

The three brothers split ways—Yazoo into town to assess the situation, Loz along with him to find out what he could about their brother and possible opponent, and Kadaj in the dusty wake of Cloud's _Fenrir_, a mad, terrible smile on his young face.


	18. Reno Has A Bad Day

Reno was ready for a vacation.

First off, he'd stood-up the best lover he'd ever had, even if that lover just happened to be a _dude_, and then he'd gotten not one but _two_ assholes calling him just hours apart! The first asshole had crushed his world. The second asshole wanted to crush the world in particular, not just Reno's—nothing personal _there_.

It was the first asshole who had him _really_ steamed, and the somewhat shallow Turk hardly ever got well and truly steamed. Because that first asshole had somehow managed to reach into Reno's soul and tear a huge, bloody chunk off—and _that_ did not sit well with a man who had no idea that a chunk had even sprung up in that particular part of him.

All this time he'd been telling himself that he was straight, it was just a bit of fun, they'd had a good time and nothing more, no big deal…when in reality Yazoo had settled inside him like he'd found home. It explained why Reno got so excited every time that girly-guy called, rare as it was. It explained why he'd gone out of his way to see Yazoo again even though he usually avoided prior lovers like the plague. It also explained the near meltdown he'd had when he'd realized there was no way in hell he could get back to Yazoo in time to salvage even the smallest bit of understanding—resulting in his usual sass and Rufus having an apoplectic fit while threatening to fire Reno and then have him murdered.

Reno had, apparently, had vague plans concerning Yazoo that he hadn't even bothered to reveal to _himself_. It was only once that Primo Asshole had called him that Reno noticed with growing alarm how truly attached to Yazoo he was. That he was freaking out about it only made the phone call worse—that the Primo Asshole was Yazoo's boyfriend of five years made him go for his half-full flask and drain it in one go. A boyfriend. _Five years_? Reno had spent years helping wives and girlfriends cheat on their significant others—what did he care when he was a hit-it and quit-it kind of guy? But Yazoo…he'd sensed so much tight restraint from that glorious man that he just _couldn't_ see Yazoo ever cheating.

But apparently he _did_ cheat, and that boyfriend didn't sound like a little guy, either. So all of Reno's plans evaporated like vapor, leaving him desperately ashamed that he'd even considered them in light of what he now knew. Here he was ready to give up chicks for this guy, and the guy was already taken. As Primo Asshole Boyfriend had said, "_Yazoo certainly doesn't need _you."

To top it off, old spiky-head showed up with his usual silent, disengaged distaste, _finally_ responding to Reno's near-frantic second call to Miss Boobs at Seventh Heaven. Rude had actually knocked him one in the head for calling Tifa that in his hearing—his rather formidable partner was a purring pussycat where Miss Boobs was concerned, and would tolerate no slander of his sensitively guarded crush.

Reno disliked Cloud's social style—moody and sullen wasn't the way to go, but had to give the blond bozo credit for moves. He'd spent the entirety of Rufus' meeting with Cloud locked outside.

Directly on the heels of that a pretty little fifteen year old boy had barged in, managed to get the best of both Rude and himself, taken Rude's EMR, and laid them both flat with it in something like seven seconds. Then he'd gone on and on about his Mother and some sort of Reunion and about all Reno (in his anguished convulsion on the floor) could make sense of was that the boy and his brothers considered the Jenova monstrosity their Mommy and wanted her back. Big time. It hadn't escaped his notice how much that kid resembled Yazoo, from his slender build to the color of his hair and eyes, even to what he wore. Not to mention that during their pow-wow, Kadaj—as he so politely introduced himself as he hit Reno with the taser—took a phone call from none other than Yazoo. And _that_ had hit Reno like a punch in the gut—his Yazoo, part of a conspiracy to end the planet. It explained so much about their tryst, about Yazoo keeping in contact with him. Reno had been played and he'd fallen for it like a sucker fresh out of high-school.

And now here he was, glaring down at Pretty Boy and Miss Boobs piled up like a couple of puppies, cushioned on a riotous growth of flowers inside the decrepit chapel Cloud seemed to call home.

This was just not Reno's day.

"I'll get Miss Tifa," Rude said, moving smoothly to her side.

"Damned right you will, yo!" Reno scoffed, scowling down at chocobo-head. "Good god, her boobs alone weigh more than spiky, here."

Rude shot him a weighty look that Reno shrugged off.

"I really need to drink more," he decided, dragging Cloud into a sitting position and squatting to lift him over his shoulder. He rather hoped he racked Cloud a good one, making sure to give his shoulder a good shrug into the other man's groin. "Fucking hell, this kid's _heavy_, yo!"

For all that he was lazy and foolish no one could ever accuse Reno of being out of shape. Heavy as Cloud was what with the addition of his blade at his back, Reno still had little trouble actually getting the slim man out to the car.

"What about his bike?" Rude asked, nodding at the _Fenrir_. He'd lovingly placed Tifa in the front seat, curling her up in absolute comfort. Right where Reno usually sat.

"What about it?" Reno snapped, dumping Cloud into the backseat and half-falling on top of him. "Gross," he breathed, secretly glad to find that his male-to-male attraction was limited to Yazoo—but that thought only brought back the washing pain of betrayal his phone call and visitor had given him. "Fuckin'…I don't know, Rude! Leave it!"

"Someone will steal it—"

"Nobody comes out here but these two morons!" Reno flared, straightening his shirt and shaking out his mussed hair, wiping his hands on his jacket as if Cloud had left a residue on him.

Rude's eyebrows lifted above his sunglasses in mild inquiry, making Reno sigh and scowl, "Yeah, I'm in a shitty mood. Sorry, bro. I'll bring the damned bike."

Rude nodded shortly, pleased by the apology.

"Catch you at Seventh Heaven, yo!" Reno said, approaching the _Fenrir_ with the alert caution of a mouse sneaking up on a cat. He heard Rude drive off and breathed a sigh of relief that his partner wouldn't have to see him struggle with the damned thing. Helicopters were Reno's forte, bikes definitely were _not_.

The _Fenrir_, however, was a smooth and user-friendly machine. Reno crowed with delight to have it purring and on the way in short order, the victory temporarily driving out the sadness and hurt of the rest of the day.

It was a quick ride back to Edge and Reno left the bike in Cloud's reserved spot, knowing no one would bother it. The car was parked out front and the seat was empty. Rude had either ganked Tifa's key or had broken in.

Reno checked the back and, sure enough, old master blades was still dreaming away. Scowling, Reno gave him a few smacks but got nothing more than a dreamy smile.

"Fuckin' pervy weirdo, yo," Reno accused, unsettled. He wondered if Miss Boobs and Spiky had done the deed and if Tifa was a freaky chick herself. Looked like Goldilocks sure was…

"Gonna propose?"

"Neh?" Reno glanced up to see Rude watching him.

"Are you going to get him out of the car or just stare at him all day?"

"I can't help it, yo," Reno said, shrugging. "His hair is fuckin' _fascinating_. It actually looks like somebody frightened it or something. Can hair get scared?"

"Just take him upstairs," Rude sighed.

Reno dragged Cloud's limp body out of the car, got him another fireman's carry, and trudged up the stairs with a chorus of curses streaming from his mouth.

It was the kids' room they stuck them in, leaving them on the twin beds in the waning daylight. Reno took a second to scan the living arrangements, seeing that Miss Boobs had her own for-one bed down the hall from the kids, and that Cloud had a bare mattress on a frame in the office off of the landing downstairs. _Interesting_.

More interesting was that neither child was present.

"Where's the kiddies at, yo?" Reno asked, perplexed. Tifa was responsible to a fault when it came to the people she cared about, there should be _some_ sign of where the kids were.

Rude looked ever so slightly concerned behind the veil of his sunglasses. He knew more about the kids than Reno did. Reno was only ever at Seventh Heaven when it was drinking time, and Tifa absolutely did not allow the children anywhere near the bar after six in the evening. Rude, however, had on several occasions found reasons to drop in and visit Tifa on some pretense or another, even going so far as to drive her and the children to the doctor's office once when Denzel was running a fever and Cloud was being his usual unreachable self.

"We should go look," Rude said, bothered by the fact that Marlene and Denzel were not close or accounted for.

Just then there was a noise in the bedroom as Cloud came out of his stupor, groaning a little as the pain receded and flinging himself out of Denzel's bed. Reno slouched into the room and watched him watching Tifa, his expression unreadable and his slender shoulders tense.

"You're fuckin' heavy, yo," Reno said, smirking to have startled the great and stoic Cloud Strife.

Rude cut to the chase and asked, "Aren't there some kids living with you?"

"Cause they ain't here, yo," Reno finished, idly scratching his head and watching the wheels turn behind Cloud's enormous blue eyes. At times like this, when the spiky-headed hero was lost in thought, he looked so much like a Siamese cat that it was uncanny and, frankly, absolutely _hilarious_ to Reno. A triangular-faced Siamese cat complete with huge, unfocused, and not-quite-with-it blue eyes. '_All he needs is a collar with a bell on it_…'

"Don't you care?" Rude asked, and Reno alone heard the barely concealed disdain in the hard, stoic man's voice. Reno knew how much Tifa meant to Rude, and so by extension her family meant a lot to Rude as well. That Cloud was the accepted protector of Tifa's household gave him certain responsibilities in Rude's eyes—responsibilities that he was failing at every turn.

"I just…" the man turned his cat-gaze to Tifa, weighing some inner conflict.

Disgusted by his indecision and silently thinking that _this_ was not the Cloud he knew, Reno sighed and said, "You're a real handful, yo."

He and Rude left to search as Cloud obviously wasn't going to do so. The pair of them set off to comb the streets, each thinking their own thoughts. Reno's returned again and again to Yazoo, a hopeless ache and bitterness tingeing the thoughts with regret. He hadn't felt stupid and used in a really long time, and the sad part was that it was the _boyfriend_ part getting him, the used for information part—not the end-of-the-world part.

Slowly, his senses started knocking insistently and he asked Rude, "Hey, yo, where's all the street rats?"

"Nowhere to be found…odd," Rude replied, noticing the absence of grubby children as well.

They left the car and started asking questions, finding out that some slender, silver-haired man had collected the children in several truckloads, claiming he was taking them to have the stigma removed.

"Ask _him_," one man said, waving towards the area behind them. "That was the truck he used."

Reno glanced around and immediately ducked behind Rude, hoping he hadn't been seen. Surreptitiously, he peeked around his partner's wide shoulder and felt his stomach sink.

It was Yazoo, he would know that assassin-smooth stride anywhere. The pale hair glimmering in the faint light made his chest ache, made his fingers itch to touch it. He'd _missed_ Yazoo so terribly…Missed seeing the beautiful face now turning towards them—beautiful and, yet, also tragically sad. There was no mistaking the glazed, pained look on that delicate, mask-like face, Reno had seen too much passion and animation from Yazoo to be fooled by this reticent façade.

His brain decided to kick him in the balls then, reminding him of what Yazoo had done. Played with him to get information—and Reno didn't fool himself, he knew that it had been his slip of the tongue that had led Kadaj's gang to the Northern Crater. Yazoo had seduced him for information and had probably wanted more of the same the night they were to meet. While Reno had no trouble flattering himself, the boyfriend combined with his sudden appearance here in Edge confirmed his worst imaginings. The player played—who would have thought?

Such a thin line between love and hate, and how often one became the other when it was least expected. Reno hadn't had a chance to fully examine or admit his feelings for Yazoo, but they boiled now to harden into something angry and cold—the darkest kind of hatred.

The hatred of one who had been betrayed.

They watched Yazoo leave the truck where it sat and mount his bike, roaring off towards the edge of town.

"Come on," Reno murmured, tugging at Rude's sleeve. "Let's follow him."

Rude complied, noticing on the way to the car how very, very different Reno had been acting since he'd stood up his girlfriend. His young friend didn't usually fail when it came to ladies—there was no wrong his glib tongue couldn't right—but there was no bounce in Reno's step, no wry humor lurking behind handsome, lazy grins. In fact, there were no grins anymore either. Either Reno was extremely depressed, or he was a man on the outs with love. Rude hoped he worked through it either way, thinking that if there was a woman alive who could land his footloose and fancy-free friend, she must be a paragon of her kind.

Still, it would be nice if Reno could be his usual carefree self, it was the only thing that made Rude's job bearable. He'd let Reno smoke in the car. That should cheer him up.

If that couldn't, what could?


	19. Unfit

Cloud had too much to think about.

He glanced back at Tifa, still unconscious on Marlene's bed, her black hair scattered in a becoming fan around her delicate face. He'd been so frightened, seeing her there in the chapel after clearly having been attacked. His worry had abated somewhat now that he knew she had suffered no lasting affects from her injuries. Now he just dreaded being here when she woke, dreaded the explanations and confessions that enforced closeness would cause.

He felt his worry for the children tearing at his gut, feeling somehow responsible for their absence. He wasn't sure where they had gone or what had happened, but he felt sure it had something to do with Kadaj. He was too wary a hunter not to recognize a trap being set, and felt it closing around him with frightening efficiency for a child barely old enough to wield a sword.

The thought brought him back to the enigma, Kadaj. He couldn't have been more shocked this early afternoon when he'd been attacked and found himself staring up at his little brother. That slight, challenging smile had said it all—no more games now, Cloud, we are _not_ on the same side. Still, it could have gone much worse. Kadaj had clearly called off those nightmare hounds just as they pounced for the kill. The idea gave him faint hope that he was not unreachable.

Rufus and his vague explanations had made it a little clearer to Cloud and he thought he understood what drove Kadaj and those two who could only be brothers to him. Knowing even as little as he did of the child, he knew that the craving to be loved and acknowledged would drive that little demon to destroy the world if needs be. He had no one else to please, after all. No one else cared to give him the attention and time he deserved, and so he pinned his little heart on a monster and did as instinct dictated. Even now, with his skull still aching from the bullet that had torn through it, Cloud could not feel anything more than a dull disappointment in that boy. How could he get angry at someone who was, essentially, still a child?

"Kadaj," he murmured, as he had when Rufus first named the bundle of energy and madness that had somehow snared him so deeply. "Kadaj…"

Named now, he was even more enticing—no longer an impersonal stranger, no longer able to hide behind anonymity and no longer able to force Cloud to keep a distance with secrecy.

Cloud gazed back out at the darkening night, sighing a little and shifting as the stigma pained him. Could he somehow reach Kadaj? Could _he_ replace whatever darkness was controlling his slender body? Was he strong enough to sift through that child's madness and find the goodness beneath? The stigma drained him more and more every day—would he finally die and leave Kadaj at loose ends again? Only then with no Cloud to stop him…

With a sudden, sickening start Cloud realized that it had been weeks since he'd _truly_ thought of Sephiroth, since he'd actually felt the pained mourning for his dead lover. No, his thoughts had been wholly occupied by Kadaj—and it was _not_ the boy's resemblance to Sephiroth that made him so precious. It relieved Cloud to know it, to know that he wasn't responding merely to surface resemblance, to know that this child could quite possibly manage to heal all of the old wounds. How long had his melancholy been focused on that boy instead of on those dead and parted from him? When exactly did the mourning for lost loved ones become the mourning for a boy he'd never gotten the chance to know? It scared him and elated him at the same time to know that Kadaj had that kind of hold over him—was able to turn him from saddened regret and make him _feel_ again. It only made him even more desperate to try and save the boy…

Tifa moved behind him, sitting up, staring at him, closed-mouthed and neutral. It was the first time they'd really seen each other since he'd fled her bed, leaving her shocked and bewildered but thankfully safe. She watched him now with no wariness, no fear, and that irritated him just a little. Hadn't she seen what he was capable of? Hadn't the manner in which he'd _finally_ climaxed bothered her common sense even a _little_? He could still feel the thrum of her pulse beneath his squeezing hands, still picture the trusting, rather perplexed look on her flushed face and her slight, pained wince…

If Tifa had a fault at all it was refusing to see anything evil in the people she loved. God help them all had she ever felt Sephiroth was her friend.

He swung away from the window, saying, "Rude and Reno are looking for them."

Her huge brown eyes glittered in the moonlight as she watched him sit down.  
Hesitantly, she asked, "You have the geostigma, don't you?"

Cloud lowered his face, unwilling to discuss his sickness with her. It had been a feat in and of itself to keep her ignorant of the stigma while she was in his arms. He'd had to escape briefly to her bathroom and wrap his arm in layers of white bandaging and hope she wouldn't question him—she so rarely ever did.

"So…you think it's okay to just give up and die?" she demanded, trying her best not to sound angry. She sighed at his silence and shifted angrily on the bed, breathing, "Yeah _buddy_."

"There's no cure," Cloud said, and even to his own ears the excuse sounded hollow. He'd stopped being useful to anyone, he'd allowed his inner demons to win and had hurt nearly everyone who claimed a bond to him—he was ready to give them their final disappointment and leave it all behind. But the longing was countered by that nagging need to find Kadaj and fix him. Cloud was, if anything, hopelessly drawn to the wounded and unprotected—it was what had made him a hero, this need to save those around him.

His response lit the fuse of Tifa's slow-to-start temper and she twisted her body on Marlene's bed, vehemently saying, "It's not stopping Denzel is it? Don't run away from it, Cloud! We can fight it together! We can help each other, I _know_ we can!"

The concern and frustration in her voice cut him to the quick and he turned his face away, trying not to let her affect him.

She heaved a sigh, hurt and wanting to hurt back, murmuring, "I guess you have to be a _real_ family for that…"

He winced, shame flooding him at her biting remark. He knew she felt that since sharing something as intimate as they had, he should come back to their makeshift family and take up his role as father and protector. He tried once again to make her understand what he was, using the plainest language possible.

"I…I'm not _fit_ to help anyone, Tifa. Not my family, not my friends—no one…"

She gave him the sing-song child's rhyme that basically scolded him for being selfishly self-pitying, causing him to lift his eyes to her in question. He'd never considered it self-pity, but Tifa very rarely ever dared to offend if she wasn't dead on target.

For the second time in one evening, Reno startled Cloud, saying from the corner of the room, "She wants you to move on, yo."

"Did you find them?" Tifa exclaimed, nearly bounding off of the bed, ready to go out and conquer the world on her kids' behalf. Cloud sadly thought that _he_ used to be the same way, forsaking everything in the face of helping those he loved.

"Only one witness," Reno said, addressing Tifa as he'd apparently decided Cloud wasn't worth his time. "Kadaj's gang took them."

"Where are they?" Cloud asked, his stomach sinking at the thought of any child in those mad hands. Kadaj was a child himself, with the same absent cruelty of a child. There really was no telling what damage he could do.

Reno made as if to answer him but Rude, never one to lose an opportunity to address Tifa, beat him to it, saying to her instead of Cloud, "The Forgotten City. Their base."

The irony didn't miss Cloud. The boy had found the one place still sacred to him, the place that was Aerith's, the place where he'd let her body sink deep into cold, clear water. A burial, but not a farewell.

He stood, saying, "Will you go? I need to get some answers from ShinRa—"

"Stop running!" Tifa helplessly cried behind him, once more goading his guilt. "I know! Even if you find the kids you might not be able to help them. Maybe something will happen that can never be undone and that scares you, doesn't it? But you need to think about now. Really take it in! Look at you, you think you've got it _so_ damned hard. Well, you hate being alone, so let people in! Sure, you may not answer the phone, but I don't see you throwing it away, either!"

Cloud refused to look at her, knowing she was right. For all that he tried to cut himself off from them, he refused to actually let them go. Perhaps that was why Tifa still clung to the hope that he would return to her, return to the man she thought she knew so well.

"_You_ go, the base is all yours, yo," Reno lazily said, looking irate and unhappy. He left, his partner in tow.

"I'll do what I can," Cloud finally said, head down, his back to her.

"That's all I ever ask of you, isn't it, Cloud?" Tifa asked, her voice so sad and low. "I'll wait here in case one of them gets away and comes home. They'll be terrified, poor little things…"

Cloud nodded, and headed out to confront his little lover, knowing even now that he would have to make some hard decisions of his own.


	20. Belief

**A/N: For those of you who might be worried: have no fear, Sephiroth is coming, and I'm gonna make it good, so stay patient! We got to get through the boring stuff to get to the goods—I'm making it as interesting as possible.**

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* * *

  
**

Kadaj hissed and made his frustrated, absolutely irate little, "Tsk!" as the man wearing that swirling red cloak made off with Cloud's limp, damaged body.

He had come, as Kadaj knew he would, in pursuit of the little girl and boy who lived with him. Loz, bless him, had dug up more information on Cloud than Kadaj could've ever hoped for, even going so far as to whip the shit out a woman Loz had commented on with, "She _smelled_ of him, _koishii_…They _do_ live together…"

Kadaj had nearly had a fit, but Loz had kept him stable, glancing with concern at the little girl, Marlene. Loz had taken a shine to the spunky child and seemed more than reluctant to let anything harm her.

Seething, Kadaj sheathed the _souba_, thinking of the look on Cloud's face when he'd shot straight for him and summarily had his ass handed to him by Kadaj. He was no novice in warfare, he was the best of the three brothers and had more ready access to Sephiroth's memories—for Cloud to come directly at him had shown Kadaj that his brother was not exactly thinking straight right now. There had been fury in Cloud's glowing blue eyes and a peculiar, disturbing sadness that Kadaj refused to think about. Three times now he'd had Cloud close enough to kiss or kill, and had done neither. Kadaj did not deal well with inactivity—he would not meet Cloud again without one of them dying.

And the thought tore his soul in two.

'_You'll always have me, dear boy_,' the Sephiroth-ghost whispered, his constant companion now and the strength that gave him the will to go on. '_I'll return and then together all of us will be a family—Mother and Father to you and your brothers…Forget Cloud, he is inconstant. Loz was right, wasn't he? You _know_ this, Kadaj. Cloud is in love with that insufferable woman and wants nothing to do with _you_…_'

Kadaj blinked rapidly, hands tightening into fists. He glanced around in time to see the little girl dash off into the woods, Loz looking after her with drawn brows and an expression of acute concern.

"Loz!" he sharply said, drawing the man's attention. "Release the children to find Mother."

Yazoo drifted up and fit himself to Kadaj's side, stroking his hair.

"_Beast_," Kadaj hissed, glaring at the direction that red-cloaked man had gone. "He'll be back for his bike. I'm tempted to stay and kill him."

"Don't bother, _koishii_, oy," Yazoo sighed, pressing a kiss to his cheek. "We only need each other, don't we?"

Kadaj leaned into him, thinking of how long it had been since he'd demanded proof of Yazoo's love beyond the occasional kiss. He was comfortable with his brother, knew that Yazoo would never turn on him or betray him—he was safe. He was _not_ Cloud.

Yazoo kissed him again and drifted off to help Loz release the children, breaking Kadaj's mental tethers to them and allowing them to slowly amble off towards Edge. Drawn by Mother, they would—hopefully—congregate wherever she was at, and it would be easy for Kadaj to follow them because he could feel each and every little heartbeat in his soul, taste every individual child he'd infected.

The last of the children left and Kadaj finally abandoned his angry vigilance to join his brothers, who stood comfortably wrapped in each others arms. In his spiteful, childish way, Kadaj wedged himself between them, still trembling with anger and confusion. To see Cloud again, so close! To be near enough to touch him and to _want_ to touch him so badly his soul ached…Kadaj buried his face in Loz's capable chest and clung tightly to him, feeling the warm comfort of Yazoo embracing them both, drawing their three bodies to tightly together it seemed they were one.

"Nah, Yazoo?" he finally inquired. Questions had been plaguing him since this morning when he placed that call to Yazoo's lover. "Those two men I hurt today…one was as big as Loz and bald, the other was thin and had red hair—which one was your lover?"

Yazoo was silent for so long that Kadaj was afraid he'd pushed too hard again. But the older man only sighed at his back, accepting the gentle caress of Loz's hand against his cheek.

"Reno is his name, Kadaj," Yazoo murmured. "He was the thin one with red hair. He has the look of a fox."

Kadaj smiled at that. Yazoo always did tend to compare people to animals—Loz to a lithe lion, Kadaj to a slinky panther, Cloud to a lone wolf.

"I should have killed him," Kadaj whispered against Loz's chest, feeling that same anger from earlier that someone had hurt Yazoo.

Yazoo sighed again and said, "_That_ would hurt me, _koishii_. That would hurt me too much."

"_Koishii_ doesn't want to hurt _you_, Yazoo," Loz assured him, clutching both of his brothers as if in fear of a fight. "But you've been hurt—_both_ of you have been hurt! And anything that hurts my brothers doesn't deserve to live!"

Indeed, Yazoo and Loz had taken particularly vengeful pleasure in toying with Cloud during their fight, wanting to wound him as much as possible. Payback for hurting their darling little tyrant. He was lucky he escaped with his life and, as far as they both were concerned, he wouldn't keep it much longer beyond another meeting.

"It doesn't matter—_none of it matters_!" Kadaj cried, holding to both of them fiercely. Impassioned, he said, "What have they ever done for us? They left us to suffer at ShinRa's hands! They scorn us and mock us and treat us as less than they are—_less_! As if they aren't _insects_ compared to Mother's greatness! We don't _need_ them! _Any of them_! All we need is Mother! _She_ will tell us what to do! _She_ will take our pain and erase it! _She_ will repay these fools for every insult, every rejection, every cruelty! All we need is Mother!"

"Mother," Loz sighed, hugging Kadaj close.

Yazoo closed his eyes, looking very much like a man groping desperately for something to believe in. When he opened them, his jade orbs were bright with fervent belief and he whispered, "Mother will make everything right."

"Yes!" Kadaj hissed, infecting them with his urgency. "And now…and now we go to ShinRa. Let Cloud come retrieve his belongings, we have more important matters to attend to. We'll do what we must and Mother can worry with the rest.

"And they'll curse the day they ever tried to treat any of us as _animals_…"


	21. Surprises

Rufus did not like surprises.

That Kadaj had actually found him in Healin and had then dropped both of his fearsome—if somewhat eccentric—bodyguards surprised him greatly.

That the boy was now pacing languidly in front of his two brothers in Rufus' office was another nasty shock that he tried to cover by hiding behind his sheet.

Reno, he noticed, was not his usual tension-diffusing self. He was staring intently at Kadaj's feminine, silent brother, who was hanging behind the bigger brother almost as if he didn't wish to be looked at. A strange reaction for so handsome a creature—upon meeting him Rufus had been certain that he was a beautiful and rather shy woman, until the graceful, reticent man had murmured something to Kadaj. Rufus idly wondered how drunk Reno was, the way he was looking at that man, his lean face a mixture of attraction and utter contempt.

Interesting.

Rude, also, was strangely out of sorts, his head jerking ever so slightly from Reno back to the brother called Yazoo, as if finally reaching the solution to a puzzle and not liking it one little bit.

"It's time," Kadaj said, and walked towards him with a swinging gait that would've made any runway model proud—the boy's blatant sexuality rather frightened Rufus. He liked power and recognized it in others and sensed that this lithe and dangerous child wielded great power with such sensuality. Kadaj, it seemed, was never one to mistake his control over others and used his lovely body to his own advantage, actually smirking when he saw the discomfit in the set of Rufus's posture. "Let's go get a good view while my brothers go and play, shall we?"

Rufus knew better than to argue with this lovely, utterly mad creature. Kadaj was passionate and determined—two things Rufus admired in others, but he was grossly misled and hideously controlled. There really was no telling what that frank, sassy little shit would do next, and Rufus wasn't really willing to see the game end so soon anyways. If anything, Kadaj was an amusing distraction and being able to admire his slender youth was a perk Rufus wasn't willing to pass over. After all, he liked to keep beautiful, powerful things around him—hence, Rude, Reno, Elena, and Tseng…Though Elena and Tseng were gone now, thanks to this walking storehouse of crazy. That, however, didn't stop Rufus from garnering a long look at Kadaj's backside when he turned away. He didn't mind lechery at all, it was one of the things he so loved about Reno…

"Go to them, find Mother," Kadaj murmured to his brothers, swinging around behind Rufus' wheelchair to push him along. "We'll rip this place apart to get her."

The big one, Loz, smiled a wry, rather cruel smile at Kadaj and left. Yazoo shot Kadaj a dubious, unsure look that quickly glazed over into fanatical belief, the pain coming off of him in near palpable waves. He averted his face when he passed Reno, and Rufus noted that his red-haired Turk couldn't keep his burning, hate-filled gaze off of Yazoo's graceful, slim figure as it disappeared out of the door.

"Rude, Reno, why don't you take the day off," Rufus said, waving them away. He knew the weird request would get their suspicions up and that they would probably go after the brothers. Rufus might consider Kadaj's backside in the same way one considered biting into a ripe plum, but that didn't mean he had to let his subordinates sit on their hands when they could be fighting to free themselves. "I think I'm safe enough with Kadaj."

The pair exchanged glances, wary. They really had no choice in the matter. He watched them go and asked, "Now, what did you want to show me, Kadaj?"

"You'll see," the boy purred, and stroked his shoulders with quick, firm hands. He pushed the chair into the elevator and they ascended to the unfinished thirteenth floor.

Rufus's lucky number.

* * *

Reno could hardly believe his good luck! Permission from the boss to fuck with the creeps—if he hadn't felt so sick inside, he might've actually been glad. Instead he just felt a fierce, hardened knot of pure loathing inside him, the scab over that bloody chunk that was torn from his soul.

Feeling confident that Rufus was more than capable of protecting himself from the little kook, especially with baby-boy's _mommy_ right there in his lap, Rude and Reno had little compunction leaving him alone. Rufus was a big boy, and if he thought he could handle Kadaj alone, well, so be it.

The two hitmen-cum-bodyguards quickly left Rufus to his own plots and games and went to collect the bird from the airfield—quick escape was always foremost in the mind of killers, and Reno wanted to be able to get airborne if the situation called for whisking Rufus out of harm's way.

It took time to get the helicopter prepped and in the air, and even more time to find a place to land that wouldn't draw the little terror's attention. Reno finally settled on putting her down on the top floor of an unfinished parking garage while Rude busily rummaged in the cargo.

They left the bird and went on foot, following the general ruckus to find a huge crowd milling around the monument—and in a circle around the monument were all the street rats, standing like little statues with their heads hanging low and their tiny bodies unmoving. The sight wrenched Reno, who too well remembered being a helpless child, and once again he felt hatred well up for the creature who could use children in such a way.

Yazoo and Loz had wrapped chains around the monument, clearly intending to take it down one way or another. Now the two brothers moved between the children, taking care not to disturb them—something Reno did not want to see, monsters with the capacity to sympathize.

The crowd antagonized them until Yazoo, his face a blank mask but for the slightest flicker of irritation, lifted his slender, gloved hand and drew forth nightmares from the cobbled surface below.

The crowd screamed and dispersed, only a few people actually making an attempt to save the children they'd so vehemently shouted over.

Reno readied his EMR, cautious of those randomly attacking things. For the most part they ignored the oblivious children, and Reno wished he hadn't seen Yazoo use a flick of his fingers to turn one away from one of the children. He wished he hadn't seen Loz shoo another with firm, disapproving hands until those creatures went for easier prey. He didn't _want_ that…he _needed_ Yazoo to be a monster. Because nobody could be in love with a monster, now could they?

He and Rude made their way through the quickly clearing crowd and Reno called out, "And what are we up to?"

He tapped his EMR against his shoulder, anticipating a fight and wanting one more badly than he had in a long, _long_ time.

When Yazoo turned to face him his whole body clenched, taking in the sight of his beauty like a physical blow. Just a look at those large, cool eyes and porcelain-doll face made him want to throw caution to the wind and beg him _why_, _why_ would he do such things? But the anger welled up, drowning it, and he steeled himself as the silky purr of Yazoo's voice questioned, "Mother's here, isn't she?"

"How do you figure?" Rude asked, at his back as always, aware of the singing tension in Reno's slender, muscled body.

The big guy, Loz, turned and gestured at the monument, saying, "ShinRa made this…monument, didn't they?"

There was something naggingly familiar about the man's voice, but Reno's brain was on auto-retort and dismissed it, focusing on his anger. It felt good to have a target for all of this hatred building up inside him, he relished being able to get rid of it.

"Oh-_ho_, don't think yourself to death there, big boy!"

"Because it isn't like that," Rude finished, the pair of them sharing a chuckle at the others' expense.

Reno looked back at Yazoo, still sneering, and the cat-like, graceful man cocked his pretty head and meaningfully breathed, "Oh? And who would trust _you_?"

Reno actually flinched, guilt flaring up in an uncomfortable, disquieting wave. Yeah, he'd stood him up, he'd come off looking like the liar, insisting that Yazoo trust him enough to hang around and wait for him all night while he never bothered to show up. But he clung to Yazoo's own sins, shocked beyond all measure that the man had the balls to actually question his integrity or the fact that Rufus trusted him.

Rude seemed to share his outrage, both of them affronted.

With a snarl of pure fury, Reno made for Yazoo, fully intending to kill him if he got ahold of him.

Unfortunately, just as he made a mad dash for him, something huge and monstrous dropped from the sky to land atop the monument, pausing him in shock.

Staring at it in open-mouthed shock, he didn't even realize he popped Rude one in the face. He gazed up at the monster and realized it was going to blow an energy ball at the monument.

"Holy…" he weakly said.

"…shit!" Rude finished, and the pair of them dashed back the way they had come, pausing to grab whatever kids they could and make a run for it.

The blast from that monster's mouth hit like a shockwave, blowing them both off of their feet to land some bit away, kissing asphalt.

It was Reno who came to first, groaning a little as the pain hit him. The kids, as kids will do, rebounded swiftly and wandered off, unmindful of the danger.

"Are we having fun yet? Oy," Yazoo sighed, gazing down at the fox-faced man and his rather bulky partner whose name he still did not know. It wasn't as if Rufus had given introductions, after all—and the Turks didn't seem to use their given names often.

He watched the two gain their feet while Kadaj's summoning raked the coals for Mother. Perhaps she wasn't even here. Perhaps the monument had simply irked Kadaj and they were here for no reason. No matter, Mother would make it right.

Reno, true to his nature, shot of a smart-ass retort and came up fighting.

Yazoo laughed, enjoying it. It had been so long since he'd seen Reno that touching him was pure joy—even if it was touching him to hurt him. Still, Yazoo blocked and blocked his furious attacks, only laying him out when Reno came close to actually hurting him. He leapt to the top of a building and looked down at Reno.

"Call it a day already!" Reno shouted up at him, his irritated look making him just that much more like a fox.

"Give us Mother and that will be the end of everything," Yazoo said, covering himself in apathy because he knew he was right—anyone without Mother's genes would die after the Reunion. The whole world would die, and Reno along with it. Still, it had been folly to think anything could come of it. Reno fought him like he was battling a demon, and his disgust was apparent. Yazoo wondered just how long it had taken once he left Reno's bed for the shame to set in…but he'd seemed so sincere on the phone…

He realized belatedly that Reno was clambering up the side of the building with preternatural speed, a snarl frozen on his face. He flipped out of the way just in time to avoid having that EMR come down on his skull with braining force.

"Forget about your Reunion! Your brother is a _kook_!" Reno snapped.

Yazoo's eyes narrowed and he softly, lowly said, "He's just a baby, he _needs_ his Mother—can't you understand? We do this for Kadaj, it's the only thing that can save him from himself."

"A _baby_? You know, when you put it like that…" Reno panted, striking and blocking Yazoo's half-hearted hits. "…_You_ sound like a kook, too!"

"Fine with me. If saving Kadaj makes me insane, then so be it. One of him is worth a world full of people like you," Yazoo said, his face cold. "At least being insane I'm not like you, Reno. _I_ try to protect the people I love…"

He thought of his pleas for Reno to stay in the helicopter and wondered if, even then, he'd known. And even when there was the possibility of Reno actually _having_ Mother, Yazoo hadn't told Kadaj out of fear that the baby would simply kill Reno and ask questions later. He'd done his best, even after Reno had so thoroughly rejected him, putting himself at risk from Kadaj's temper when he admitted to the baby that killing Reno would truly hurt him.

And for what? For _this_? For this contempt that cut like a blade? For this hatred? Reno had more than confirmed what Yazoo had feared and the pain of it ate away what little was left of Yazoo's will to resist Mother. Even being nothing would be greater than this offense. Perhaps it would be best if resurrecting Sephiroth _did_ destroy the three of them. There was no room in this harsh, cruel world for them and not a single soul to care if they left it.

"Yeah…like your _boyfriend_?" Reno snapped, coming at him.

Yazoo had almost forgotten Loz's prank, and said with no little confusion, "I don't have a boyfriend."

"_Liar_," Reno growled, and when he attacked it was with murder in his eyes.

"I've never lied to you," Yazoo murmured, and gave him a kick that sent him crashing into a street sign and down into his partner's arms.

Yazoo leapt down after him and landed lightly beside his prone body. Again the pair struggled to their feet and Yazoo laughed, covering the welling panic inside him. Things were spiraling out of control and Yazoo was losing himself with it.

And then, before the foursome could continue their fight, the baby shrieked in furious anger and the building above them exploded into fire.


	22. What Yazoo Earned

Rude glanced over at his partner, frowning at the aura that surrounded him. With that bomb in his hands Reno was relaxed, almost happy, and that _bothered_ Rude. Because he had seen at once what the source of Reno's downward spiral was—and it was one shocking source, for sure. He'd never viewed Reno as having the slightest interest in men, but then again, leave it to Reno to fall hard for something he couldn't have. Women were just too easy, no challenge at all for his handsome friend.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Rude asked. He'd readied the bombs when they flew the bird in earlier, and had fetched them when they landed on the unfinished highway. They weren't much—just a mixture of materia, fireworks, and TNT. Not enough to kill those boys outright, but enough to collapse the road beneath them. Why bother blowing them up when the fall would take care of them just the same?

"Yeah," Reno shortly said, and that unsettling smile passed over his lips. "So, this thing got any bite to it?"

"ShinRa technology at its finest," Rude replied, deciding to leave it alone. He didn't expect Reno to live his life for him, he would give Reno that same courtesy.

"Oh-ho!" Reno chuckled, bouncing it in his hand. And again he looked _far_ to happy—he was making this _personal_, and Turks couldn't allow things to get personal. "So _you_ made this?"

"If nothing else, it's flashy," Rude told him, smirking a little. The fireworks had been an afterthought, something he thought might make Reno laugh.

Reno grinned, his big eyes closing briefly in what might have been an attempt at humor.

Rude gave him a look and added, "I know how much you like flashy."

Reno sighed, gazing at the entrance to the tunnel with all the predatory interest of a wolf, his hand tightening on the bomb he held.

"No overtime tonight…"

Rude didn't like the way he said it. These bombs shouldn't damage either themselves or the bird if placed right. He hoped that Reno wasn't considering actually suicide bombing those two kids to make sure he got them.

"Let me have that," he said, reaching for it.

"Don't worry, yo," Reno said, a flash of his old self peeking through as he hastily evaded Rude's reaching hand. "I'm not into self-sacrifice. I just wanna watch these fuckers die."

"Why?" Rude asked, point-blank.

Reno's face dropped into frightening stillness and he stared stubbornly at the tunnel entrance, refusing to answer.

Perplexed by his behavior, Rude sighed and settled next to him, hearing the approach of motors.

Seconds later, Cloud whizzed past, eyes ablaze with light and life.

Rude and Reno placed the bombs and backed off.

'_Come get it, Yazoo_,' Reno silently cursed, a vicious smile of anticipation on his lean face. '_Come collect your earnings, you sick fuck…_'

Like a ghost the bike appeared from the darkness of the tunnel, two white-faced wraiths on its back.

Blue eyes met jade, met and held for a split-second.

It was long enough for Reno to give him a cruel, cold smile.

There was a flash of awful, encompassing suffering on Yazoo's beautiful face, and then the blast knocked everything apart.


	23. What Kadaj Does For Love

Kadaj stood atop the highest point he could find in the ruined metropolis of Midgar, the wind ruffling his hair. He held Mother's container contemplatively, over the shock of having finally seen her, over the shock of realizing that the voices he'd heard had been Sephiroth alone all along—a selfish creature wanting to return. There was no way this…_mess_ of defrosted, shriveled flesh could speak to him.

His soul still throbbed for Yazoo and Loz, his connection to them dimmed by what that explosion had done. His Yazoo, who had loved that red-haired man so dearly. Kadaj had been staggered by Yazoo's despairing, hopeless realization accompanied with a brief, sharp picture of that smirking fox-face before the world went white with the explosion. His brothers, who should be here with him for this because between the three of them, none of them would have to completely resign themselves to Sephiroth. They should be here for this bittersweet triumph…

Cloud came towards him, determined and patient as a saint, his sword held tightly in his right hand. The blue eyes that gazed up at him were sad and resigned, but he was so beloved—couldn't he understand how excited Kadaj was that he'd _finally_ done as he'd promised?

"Brother! I've found Mother!" he called, his voice trembling. He realized suddenly that he was _afraid_ of Cloud. Afraid of hurting him. Afraid that when the time came, Cloud would sacrifice him to have Sephiroth back.

"So what happens now?" Cloud asked, not easily swayed to violence, still calm, merely wary.

"Mother will tell me," Kadaj said, a wry smile on his lips. Sephiroth-mother, Sephiroth-father, Sephiroth-Kadaj—was no one who they seemed? He looked at Cloud and saw the faintest stirrings of anger, a slight tightening of that full mouth.

"I guess avatars don't get the memo," he lowly said, his body tensing.

Kadaj summoned that power inside him, insulting Cloud and firing an energy ball at him all at once. This was necessary, this fight, this dance—foreplay for the Reunion to come. Kadaj didn't mistake it, he knew Cloud's inner darkness relished violence. The least he could do was warm him up for Sephiroth, wasn't it? Even if that sliver of his soul shrank in on itself and wept in shame and desperate, aching pain.

They battled across the uneven surfaces, fighting fiercely even as Cloud's face stayed smooth and unaffected, his huge blue eyes distant. Finally, Kadaj twisted and managed to pin that Buster Sword between the blades of the _souba_, reminding him sadly of their first meeting.

"Don't make me do this, Kadaj, _please_," Cloud suddenly whispered, his blue eyes sparkling with sudden emotion, his slim, beautiful face so angelic in the light that Kadaj madly, wildly thought he would do _anything_ for Cloud…even give him Sephiroth, if that was what he truly wanted. Cloud's next words hammered that thought home, proving to Kadaj that Cloud, indeed, only wanted his old lover back. "Please don't make me kill someone I love, not again."

_That's why he hasn't been _trying_ to hurt you, little tyrant. That's why he's been so careful of you—he wants _me_ back, not _you_. You heard it with your own little ears, Kadaj, he doesn't want to kill me again. This time it will work and we'll be together forever…_

Choking on a sob, Kadaj wrenched the _souba _away, skittering back, his soul burning inside him. He regarded Cloud through a sheen of tears, panting at the sharp pain.

_I love you, I love you, I love you…and I will do this for you, Cloud…_

Snarling, Kadaj sprang high, silhouetted against the sun as he brought the _souba_ down in a long, hard arc.

Cloud whirled his sword around and deflected Kadaj's attack with one swing of his blade, knocking the child back and over the side of the building.

Kadaj managed to hang onto a ledge by one hand, watching his blade fall down into the darkness below with a frustrated, "Tsk!"

A noise drew his attention and he looked up to see Cloud gazing down at him with the impersonal disinterest of a jaded god. He just stood there, making no attempt to interfere with Kadaj or assist him. And still he didn't say what Kadaj _needed_ him to say—don't do this. Don't do this, and Kadaj would hand over Mother and let it all go. Don't do this, and he would give up his mad quest. Because if Cloud said not to do it, then he didn't want to see Sephiroth again, and that meant there might be room for Kadaj.

And Cloud said nothing.

Kadaj blinked away tears. His voice thick, he whispered, "If this is what you want, Cloud, I'll give it to you—you mean too much to me for me to deny you, and a world without you just isn't a place that I want to live. Enjoy Sephiroth, brother, and I pray he doesn't kill you for what you've done…"

He threw the container of Jenova's cells, registering the sharp panic on Cloud's face. So. He thought his chance at his old lover was falling with Mother, did he?

Kadaj launched himself after it, reaching into the container and hugging the cells to his chest.

"Welcome to my Reunion, brother. I hope it's everything you wanted…"

The pain was sharp and intense, a crucifixion of the soul.

And then there was nothing.

No vision, no hearing, no pain.

No Kadaj.

* * *

**A/N: I know you're getting nervous, it's OK, I'll make sure everything is alright. Just trust me, will you? Have I led you wrong so far? Well, maybe just a little, and you may not like the ending, but you'll never know unless you read it. Just know that I love Kadaj to bits and that I'd be a daft get to leave Reno hanging. Trust me.**


	24. Taming the Beast!

**A/N: I appreciate your patience and I hope I don't disappoint. I promise you that things might seem to go the way of the movie, but I'm rather known for my irreverence regarding…well, everything. Have no fear, I'll make things right (in my eyes). Word of warning, though: in a contest of sadism between Sephiroth and myself, **_**I**_** would win.**

**Hands down.**

* * *

"It's been a long time, Cloud."

Oh _god_.

He couldn't breath. He couldn't move. All he could do was stare down into glowing feline eyes with stark fear, his pulse pounding in his ears. Fear because when Sephiroth was near him, Cloud never quite knew what he was capable of—the man had kept him in thrall for so long, so many times…

Cloud leapt back, seeking shelter in distance, watching with horrified dread as that long, slender body leapt gracefully over his head to land above him. Just the same as he ever was, so beautiful it made Cloud's soul ache, that silver hair floating around him to coyly stroke his body—such pale skin wrapped in all that leather. What a thrill it had always been to pull it away bit by bit, biting and licking what he revealed.

"Your stigma is gone…that's too bad," Sephiroth purred, the _Masamune_ held loosely in his left hand as always, deceptively nonchalant.

"Sephiroth," Cloud said, proud that his voice was so strong. He looked for that abject worship inside himself, waited for the beast to come roaring to the fore in response to Sephiroth's pull. But, as with Tifa, the beast was only sluggishly interested, its belly sated on other, sweeter meat. "What do you want?"

"The ghosts of the stigma victims, Cloud—haven't you noticed? They return to the Lifestream and erode it, killing the planet with slow infection," the man lowly said, his smile as cruel and compelling as ever. "What I _want_, Cloud, is to sail the darkness of the cosmos with this planet as my vessel, just like my Mother did so long ago."

He lifted his empty right hand, calling upon the negative force of those who had died of the stigma, conjuring up darkness to cover the waning light, the evil-looking fog rolling in around them like poisonous smog.

"And then one day we will find a new planet," Sephiroth whispered, perfect, beautiful pink lips moving, green eyes flashing with mad glee. "And on its soil we will build a shining future."

Cloud winced, understanding the implication—Cloud had Jenova cells, he would be spared this second coming, he would escape whatever tortures this leprous Lazarus could concoct. Her cells were, after all, far too precious to Sephiroth to waste. That he assumed Cloud would be grateful to be spared, that he assumed Cloud would once more fall into his arms with grateful tears angered the young man.

That Sephiroth had stolen Kadaj infuriated him.

"And what happens to _this_ planet?" Cloud asked, his teeth clenched in an effort to control his temper. The beast reared its head as it had through his battle with Kadaj, searching and searching, moving restlessly inside of Cloud as it had for so many years.

Sephiroth laughed, and the sound was like silk down Cloud's skin, making him shudder and feel a sudden pang of longing.

"Well…That's up to you," he said.

Before Cloud could even interpret this, Sephiroth rushed him and the battle was on.

As always, he had to push to keep up with the maddeningly agile General, blocking those left-handed strikes with no little difficulty—Cloud fought so few left-handed people that he just wasn't used to it still. However, he clung to the fact that by hook or by crook he had killed this man twice before. That Kadaj was in there somewhere, that he might be watching from inside, made Cloud hesitate to hurt him. He hadn't done well by his little lover at all, and had been too cautious of being hurt during their fight to appropriately express himself. Cloud was not a speaker by nature, and Kadaj tied him up in knots—by the time he understood what the boy had inferred from his responses, it had been too late to convince him otherwise. That Kadaj had wrought this havoc out of love for him made it even worse. He'd abandoned his doomed and one-sided love of Sephiroth weeks ago, whenever that slender, mad, and hopelessly lovable child had climbed up behind him on the _Fenrir_ and whispered, "Let's go."

And again Sephiroth was playing with him, ignoring chance after chance to strike him down, toying with him because it was amusing. The bigger man slammed him into the remains of an office building and was quick to follow, striking and striking until Cloud was pinned to the wall with _Masamune_'s blade piercing the meat of his left shoulder.

"_This_ is the boy I remember," Sephiroth purred, smiling at Cloud's pained grimace. "What a man you've tried to become, pretty little Cloud."

Cloud glared up at him, gasping when the blade was withdrawn, Sephiroth's gloved hand gripping the crossed straps of his sword-harness.

"So sweet," he murmured, and Cloud's vision was full of him, wide eyes taking in every beloved, beautiful contour of his patrician face. So exquisite, his Sephiroth, so cold and utterly cruel—so persuasive and seductive, and the pain just made his pulse jump, the desire stirring inside him. And still the beast sought, a roiling threat beneath the surface, searching for something it wanted.

Those perfect, bitter lips pressed to his in a kiss that was as scorching as it was harsh, blood welling from his mouth as the man's sharp teeth pierced the softness of his lower lip, reopening old wounds through the scar Cloud had always carried from the night of their first kiss. That hot, silky tongue swept into his mouth, welcome and needed. Cloud's fickle body tightened, moving closer to the incredible heat of him, fitting easily to each contour and swell of muscle that he remembered so clearly. Before he could control it, his free hand slid up inside Sephiroth's long coat of its own accord, slipping over the ripple of his stomach to where his heart beat hard against his breastbone.

"My Cloud," Sephiroth whispered against his mouth, and his voice was amused by his easy capitulation, full of that arrogance that so defined him. "How did you ever think you would be whole without me?"

Eyes hazy with mounting desire, Cloud could only gaze at him, his healing lip holding a single drop of blood that Sephiroth's long tongue snaked out to taste.

"You've been a bad, bad boy," Sephiroth whispered, and Cloud shuddered to hear the echo of his own words, knowing now that Sephiroth had witnessed what he'd done to Kadaj's slender little body.

He shoved Cloud hard, knocking the breath out of him, pressing him into the wall with such force his bones complained. Just as quickly, he spun him around, knocking the sword to the ground, pushing Cloud's forehead into the wall so hard that his skin split, bleeding briefly before reknitting itself. Cloud groaned, vision swimming at the harsh treatment, hardly aware that Sephiroth had sheathed the _Masamune_ and was easily tearing open his pants.

"You always were mine," Sephiroth gloated, sliding Cloud's loosened jeans down to run his hands covetously over the younger man's firm white flesh. "You always will be."

"No," Cloud said, shaking his aching head until the pain receded, his gloved hands digging into the wall. "Not _yours_."

Sephiroth chuckled, his hand settling at the base of Cloud's spine, drawing forth a sudden, searing heat.

Cloud lowered his head to feel it, to know that after all this time that mark was still upon him. When Sephiroth had taken Cloud to bed once so many years ago, he'd indelibly branded his ownership in Cloud's soft, pale skin—a mark that glowed with unnatural power, sealed there with Sephiroth's muttered words and called forth whenever the man placed his hands on Cloud. At first even when Sephiroth merely _thought_ of Cloud, the mark would glow. Now it burned against his skin with shimmering blue light, mako bright and unhealthy, a character meaning utter, graceful, and delighted submission.

"Yes, _mine_," Sephiroth hissed in his ear, dragging his teeth into Cloud's tender lobe, his thumb tracing that mark. "It glows as brightly now as it ever did, Cloud. Only when this mark dies on your skin will you be free of me…For now, you are utterly mine."

Frustrated, angry tears formed in Cloud's eyes, the helpless reaction to being such a traitor to his own self. Deep down, he wanted this, even though the desire smacked of ugly, bitter betrayal. Resisting Sephiroth was like trying to resist gravity, trying to resist the relentless pull of the ocean—no matter how you fought it, you never won, you could only give in.

"Such a pitiful boy," Sephiroth said, his tone cold and amused, teasing Cloud with his own weakness. For a pure sadist, Cloud was delicious prey. "Will you weep for me, Cloud? Will you curse me when I bring you pleasure? You may hate me as much as you love me, but you'll never hate me more than you hate _yourself_."

That gloved hand slid up inside his sweater and down his trembling belly, tightening muscle under its slow, downward journey. Sephiroth traced the pink seam of his scar, crooning beneath his breath, his tongue curling out to pull Cloud's earlobe into his mouth and suck gently, rolling his earring between hard, threatening teeth. Feeling the scar brought him to pulsing life behind Cloud, a fact made apparent when he pressed against Cloud's bared backside, making him catch his breath. There was something achingly erotic in that gentle, gliding finger tracing that terrible scar, tickling the shiny skin on its way down.

Cloud moaned, shuddering, pressing back against that hard heat and hating himself. And still the beast merely bubbled beneath the surface, drawn by what was happening but not coaxed. This new facet to his darkest desires vaguely disturbed Cloud. Always before it came pounding to the surface regardless of who he was with, overcoming his natural hesitance and replacing it with a sadist's indulgent demands. Yet it seemed disturbed, even moreso a thing separated from Cloud, something living inside him without his approval. Now it seemed it was waiting for him to choose.

But those hands! Those hands slid down to the tops of his thighs, Sephiroth's hard thumbs digging into the muscles just above the joint, where his belly narrowed into his loins, getting an instant, straining response as Cloud moaned again, his cock suddenly swelling to attention.

"Oh-ho!" Sephiroth chuckled, raking his teeth down Cloud's neck, running his tongue back up the welts. "You _have_ missed me, haven't you?"

"P…please," Cloud whispered, wanting to tell him to stop, but it felt so good, and Sephiroth was so hard against him.

"Sh, don't beg," Sephiroth murmured, laving his smooth cheek, one hand dipping down to roll his balls while the other skimmed up to pinch his nipple viciously enough that Cloud winced, hips jerking a little as his cock twitched. "There'll be plenty of time for you to beg me in the centuries to come…"

"No!" Cloud denied, trying to shake it away, trying not to let it affect him.

But it was.

Oh, god help him, it _was_.

"Will you cum for me, pretty Cloud?" Sephiroth whispered, unfastening his own pants and releasing the straining warmth of his cock, the tip wet and sticky and ready. Hard hands shifted his unresisting hips, parting his buttocks, the silky tip of him teasing until Cloud groaned. With a soft moan of delight Sephiroth nudged into him, making Cloud wince. Sephiroth was by no means a small man, and had no desire to be gentle with him. As he slowly but surely impaled Cloud on his hard, wide cock, he chuckled at Cloud's abortive, pained, and conflicted movements—shuddering to get away, trembling to get more. "What a beauty you are, Cloud. How can you waste yourself on such undeserving creatures? Only I am fit to taste you, to touch you, to _own_ you…"

Cloud groaned a little in an agony of pain and pleasure, his cock straining, so hard it almost hurt, his balls tight with tension as that enormous cock worked in bit by excruciating bit.

"Will you cum for me, Cloud?" Sephiroth asked again, coolly amused. He slid one silky, gloved finger from the base of Cloud's cock to his swollen tip, the touch feather light and teasing. "Cum for me without me even having to touch you? Will you submit to me, my sweet little boy?"

Cloud's body pulled taut, the pleasure racing along his nerves in starbursts of sensation, his breath coming in ragged pants, his fingers digging into the wall so hard that the plaster crumbled. And still that silky length pressed further, so deep, so wide, so achingly full.

"Cum for me," Sephiroth whispered, the words going straight to Cloud's groin, making him spasm on the rigid flesh inside him. Those hands pressed on his stomach, palms against the taut muscle on either side of Cloud's heavy sex, close but not close enough—merely a tease, another assurance that Cloud would cum when he was bidden. "Cum for me."

Deeper and deeper, so deep Cloud's teeth clenched, so deep it forced a pained, frustrated cry from him.

He was overcome by the pleasure of it, trembling on the verge of an explosive climax, held back only by Sephiroth's control of him.

"Cum for me." That cock slid the last little bit, and as Sephiroth settled fully inside of Cloud, he whispered, "Cum for me _now_."

Cloud threw back his head, a harsh sob torn from between his clenched teeth as the overwhelming pleasure burst through him. His body clamped down frantically on that huge cock inside him as his hips pistoned madly, thrusting into unresisting air, his throbbing sex seeking something, _anything_ to give him the friction he craved. But there was nothing. His cock bounced wildly, jetting thick streams of cum against the wall with remarkable force. It was an agonizing pleasure, being forced to cum without being touched. It was delicious punishment, the most painful and amazing way to climax. His body shuddered brutally, every muscle pulled to snapping tautness, his ragged, harsh cries loud in the darkness, accompanied by Sephiroth's amused chuckles.

At the height of his raging orgasm, Sephiroth breathed into his ear, "Good boy," and that silky, gloved hand roughly gripped his now-weakly spurting cock and cruelly began to milk him.

Cloud snarled in the mingled pain and pleasure of it, that slick hand wrapped so tightly around him and jerking so hard on his flesh, drawing the orgasm out while Cloud hissed and tensed even more around Sephiroth's hard cock.

Sephiroth shifted behind him, pulling out almost to the tip and ramming back into Cloud hard enough to force him onto his toes, a harsh scream pouring from his parted lips. That huge, hot cock moved inside him like a force of nature, welcome and devastating. Cloud writhed, torn between the pleasure of it and the pained sensation of Sephiroth still jerking him off. He moved back against those cruel, thrusting hips, letting the force of it shove him hard into Sephiroth's hand, letting the pleasure of it mingle with the pain until he hovered on the sweet, aching precipice of another hard cum.

"Give me that darkness," Sephiroth whispered, twisting Cloud's cock cruelly until he yelped, jerking back to escape the pain. "Give me what I want."

Cloud opened himself to the beast.

And the beast did not come.

It was there, filling him, waiting eagerly for what it wanted.

But it didn't want Sephiroth.

As with Tifa, it was willing to answer to the lure of sex, wanting pain and needing to give it to reach its peak, but it wasn't answering to Sephiroth's siren call, just as it hadn't answered to Tifa's gentle persuasion.

The beast wanted only one. It had tasted the sweetest flesh, dined on the most exquisite of pain, been stroked by the most skillful of hands—and it would only suffer others because it could not resist the temptation of sex.

But the beast wanted _Kadaj_.

Cloud's eyes snapped open in startled dismay when he understood it, when he simultaneously realized that the beast was no separate entity inside him but merely a part of himself that he desperately wanted to embrace, and that he had no reason to fear its power anymore. Because the beast had fed at the hand of the one it loved and it wanted no other.

His perfect pink lips curved into a smile, and he viciously whispered, "I don't belong to _you_."


	25. The End?

"I don't belong to _you_."

He felt it the second the mark went dead on his skin, drifting away to nothingness, the bond irreparably broken.

Sephiroth hissed at his back, infuriated that Cloud would utter such words, that he would defy him to the point that his mark of ownership died.

"How _dare_ you?" he snarled, working furiously into Cloud, grinding him into the wall—no grace now, nothing but anger and a sadist's desire to hurt.

Cloud groaned beneath the assault but felt nothing, nothing but the keen appetite of the beast to kiss and hold Kadaj, to sink his teeth into soft flesh, to lap at that sweet blood, to lay his own mark upon unstained white skin and utter those binding words, 'You are mine. You are _mine_.'

"You will _always_ belong to me, Cloud!" Sephiroth snarled, and surged hard against him in an orgasm that made Cloud moan a little, breathless with the force of it. But as good as it felt, it wasn't what he wanted, and it hadn't been for quite some time.

"Not anymore," he whispered, feeling Sephiroth tear away from him, his anger renewed by Cloud's defection. "You _never_ loved me, Sephiroth. What would you know of self-sacrifice? What would you know of desperation? What would you know of that aching desire to be loved, like a gaping hole in your heart?"

He righted his clothing, grimacing at the mess of Sephiroth's seed slowly seeping down his thighs, and turned to face the seething man he'd once loved so very, very much.

He realized that, deep down, he always would love Sephiroth, but with the bittersweet, fond recollection of a memory. They had seen so much together, such horror and such pain, such passion and such vicious cruelty to one another. He would, in a sense, be bound to this man for as long as his memory lasted—and that suited Cloud just fine. Because memories were only memories, but the flesh was here and now, and he would not waste another second hiding in the past, mourning things outside of his control. However this turned out, whichever one of them died, Cloud would somehow find Kadaj.

And when he did he would never let him go.

"Arrogant, ungrateful, inconstant little child," Sephiroth hissed, and then calm fell over him like a shroud, his eyes narrowing with calculating menace. He smiled at Cloud, his cruel and removed smile, a smile that evinced no joy or pleasure—just malice and spite. "You fancy that you love him, my little tyrant Kadaj…_how very trite of you, Cloud_."

Cloud went for his sword even as Sephiroth drew the _Masamune_ with the speed of a snake striking. Metal clashed against metal, drawing streaking light from the darkness, each leaning in to test the other's balance.

"Oh-ho," Sephiroth chuckled, amused as always by Cloud's attempts to best him. "Where have you found this _strength_, little Cloud? To banish my mark, to _resist_ me…"

"Like I can explain it to _you_," Cloud snarled, giving him a strike that had him leaping up into the darkness. More to himself, he breathed, "I will fight you forever, monster, to get Kadaj back. _That_ is where I've found this strength."

They battled again, the fight as furious and dangerous as ever it was. And still Sephiroth taunted him, holding back his strikes, still arrogantly convinced that he could sway Cloud to his side.

"I've thought of a perfect gift for you," he said, sailing up and away, graceful and deadly. "Shall I give you _despair_?"

Cloud scowled at him, determined to see an end to him. A _final_ end.

"Kneel," Sephiroth said, his lips quirking in a cat-like smile. "_Beg_ for my forgiveness."

"I would rather die," Cloud said, chopping his way up through the falling debris of ShinRa's old, shattered headquarters.

The two of them fought their way to the rooftops, Cloud tiring dangerously. Though healed of the stigma itself, the effects still remained, exhausting his resources much faster than usual.

Sephiroth bypassed a death-strike to shove him off of his feet. Did it again to give him a kick that landed him against the wall on his ass, summarily pinning him in place with the blade through his right shoulder this time, the blood gushing out bright and hot.

"Tell me what means the most to you, my darling little Cloud," Sephiroth murmured, his eyes cruel and bright with anticipation. "Tell me so that I can have the pleasure of taking it from you…"

In his heart, Cloud sadly realized that Sephiroth had _already_ taken what meant the most to Cloud. He thought of Aerith, Zack, of Tifa and the kids, even of Rufus and his eccentric Turks. And Kadaj…already gone, absorbed into the strength of Sephiroth's will, his body merely cells rearranged to suit the soul it hosted. Such heartless use of a creature so terribly lonely and afraid.

Cloud shoved the blade out of his shoulder with a strength born of anger, turning to strike but Sephiroth was already gone.

"You just don't understand, do you?" he asked, comprehending at last what Sephiroth truly was. "There's _nothing_ I don't treasure!"

When the larger man sprang away, Cloud pulled the final rabbit out of his hat, opening himself up for a move he'd never had to use before. He slung the sword out, releasing the many smaller blades, and went for the first one in a burst of speed that Sephiroth simply could not follow.

It was quick and brutal work, the rapid, powerful strikes finally breaking Sephiroth's power. As if in response, the sky began to clear, the setting sun pouring down upon them.

Cloud hit the ground on his feet, his swords falling around him, his right hand almost languidly catching the falling buster sword's hilt. He kept his calm, beautiful face turned up to Sephiroth's floating form, silently moved when that one pitch-black, delicate wing sprang from Sephiroth's back, so dark against the waning daylight. Such beauty from such darkness, the two so well suited to each other.

"Stay in my memories," Cloud softly said, and it came out like a prayer, like a plea. "Where you belong."

Sephiroth looked down at him, reluctant admiration on his sculpted, fine features. Once again his lover had bested him. Once again Cloud had proven to be the only one strong enough for him.

"I will never be a _memory_," Sephiroth promised, and folded that black-as-sin wing around himself, his body dissolving in a flurry of silver strands and black feathers.

It was Kadaj's limp, battered body that slowly slumped to the ground.

Cloud wanted to go to him but realized the boy didn't quite understand what was going on. Warily, he waited for recognition to light those jade green eyes, but Kadaj was on automatic defense. He staggered to his feet and lunged at Cloud only to stumble at the last second, tumbling into his waiting arms with his perfect white teeth clenched.

Cloud gazed down at his beautiful, beloved face, tears forming in his blue eyes when Kadaj whispered, "Brother?" and groped to touch his face.

"Don't leave me," Cloud whispered, cradling him close, his voice low with emotion. "Kadaj…I love you. I love _you_. I…Please, don't leave me…"

"I'll never leave you," Kadaj said, his body shuddering with sudden pain. Sephiroth had used his body as a parasite uses a host—and now Kadaj suffered through the effects of Cloud's attacks. It was Sephiroth's final, spiteful dig at Cloud, leaving Kadaj so battered and wounded that he couldn't possibly survive.

Cloud's warm, wet tears mingled with the rain that fell like forgiveness from the clearing sky, all traces of Sephiroth's dark fog evaporating. He heard Aerith's voice when she called for Kadaj, and clung to him with all of his might, weeping when that little hand reached up to grasp what only he could see. He heard Aerith inside his head, begging him to let Kadaj go, let him be freed for once of the pain he'd lived with his whole short life.

'_But I love him_,' he silently begged, forcing himself not to tear the boy away.

'_Then let him be healed_,' Aerith said, her voice bubbling with joy as always. '_Has the world been so unkind to you, Cloud, that you don't trust me anymore?_'

His brows pulled low with confusion, but he gently kissed Kadaj, whispering, "I love you…don't forget that…Don't forget _me_…"

"Brother," Kadaj said, smiling, his eyes distant. "I love you, too…"

As his little body dissolved into the Lifestream, Cloud heard his soft voice echo back, "I will _never_ leave you…"

Cloud stood as Kadaj's body rose to disappear into sparks of pure energy, flowing into the Lifestream at Aerith's behest. He let the tears come, there was rain enough to hide them, to sooth them. He felt rooted to the spot, aching for Kadaj to return to him, knowing that this time he would never find such a thing again. He was a man always destined to lose the ones he loved most, and that thought was as terribly saddening as it was true.

He was unprepared for the shot that hit him, blowing through his chest so near his heart that a nudge to the left would've killed him—mako-enhanced or not. He dropped to one knee, gasping for breath, pain and sudden anger filling him.

"We go together," he heard Kadaj's brother said, his voice stilted and broken.

"Together, we'll play," the big one put in, in no better shape than the other.

Cloud staggered to his feet, teeth clenched, and whipped his head around to see them.

"You…you hurt him," the big one said. "You…killed our Kadaj…"

"You're…you're a monster…"

The words hit him harshly, flaying at his raw emotions, filling him with guilt at how badly he'd failed Kadaj. Snarling with a wolf's own fury, Cloud turned on them and rushed them, dragging the sword along the ground and striking sparks.

The two brothers stood their ground, materia glowing inside them as they released a surge of power. All three were blasted by the resulting explosion that no one could survive.

Not even Cloud.

* * *

**A/N: keep up with the trust, keep it going!**


	26. Rude In Love

It had been two weeks since Tifa thought she'd lost Cloud.

He'd died in that rooftop explosion. She knew, they'd _checked_. She'd come home in tears, unprepared to tell the kids that their father-figure had died in battle, at a loss for how to explain it.

But Marlene had been so insistent, finally convincing Barrett to take them to Aerith's chapel where, surprisingly, a large number of parents and children had gathered at the fringes of the pool of clear water now filling a new crater in the floor.

Tifa had been lost in tears, clinging to Yuffie, miserable at the idea of a lifetime spent without Cloud. She hadn't even noticed when the children went down into the pool, their faces full of the calm conviction of those who knew precisely what they were doing.

It was Marlene's gentle chiding that had dried her silent tears, Marlene's soft assurance that Cloud was just fine, that he would be back soon, that there was no reason to cry. And so Tifa had dried her tears and fixed a smile on for the kids, abjectly grateful that the mask fooled the little girl she so loved.

But it was Tifa who had been fooled, thinking she knew so much about life and death. Beneath those confident, innocent hands, Cloud had slowly flickered into being, his supine form growing more solid by the moment. As he'd laid there, suspended by the water, Tifa had nearly broken down again, so happy to see him that she was sure she'd burst with it.

Moments later, his familiar, gorgeous blue eyes fluttered open and he'd stood, whole and alive and welcome.

And now, weeks later, Tifa recalled that moment with bittersweet sadness.

She stopped scrubbing at the bar, taking a moment to hold her hand over her belly. So little yet, and so precious, hidden inside her—a secret, hers alone. She couldn't tell Cloud, couldn't add to his troubles, he mourned as he always had but now it had the flavor of despair to it. Cloud still ached for someone, and the ache was festering inside of him, poisoning him.

The bar door chimed and Tifa glanced up, not surprised to see Rude. The large, reticent Turk had actually become quite close to her over the last year, even moreso over the last few months. Tifa found that it was Rude she called when she needed something, it was Rude she turned to when a problem arose. It was Rude who gave her advice, calmly and rationally, always willing to help her, always answering his phone no matter what hour she called or where he was at. He'd become a rock upon which she'd slowly started to depend, his stability and quiet, constant dependability something that drew her more and more each day.

He'd picked the worst possible time to drop in, because Tifa was certainly not at her strongest. Tears threatened, and Tifa hated to cry.

"Miss Tifa," Rude said, always so formal with her, even after all this time. "I'm sorry if I'm intruding—I tried calling earlier to see if you still needed me to take Marlene to practice—"

"Oh, of course! I'm so sorry, Rude, I'm not quite with it," Tifa said, a little breathless with her desperation to sound fine and dandy. "I should have called you, I completely forgot—Barrett came back yesterday, he decided to take her."

"Oh," Rude said, nodding solemnly, but Tifa could sense his keen disappointment. "Well, I guess I'll be going then…"

"Please stay!" Tifa said, surprising herself. She hated to see him so downcast. He'd done so much for her and her little family. "I…I'm sorry, Rude. Would you like to stay? I'm not quite myself today. Please have a seat, I'll fix you a drink. Water with a cherry, right?"

Rude smiled slightly and sat down, his pleasure at her company showing in his relaxed posture.

"How's Reno?" she asked, getting him his fizzy water and plopping a cherry into it. She placed it before him, worried by his solemn frown. "Don't tell me he's still…"

"Mister ShinRa has given Reno enforced leave to pull himself together," Rude said, the concern heavy in his voice. "I think he's trying to drink himself to death. The last time I was in his apartment there was nothing but booze…I only hope he hasn't started on the drugs."

Rude suppressed a shudder, recalling years before when he'd stayed with Reno through the ugly, wretched process of detoxing. That he worried his friend would be so far gone merely concerned him all the more. To cover his apprehension, he took a sip of the water, relishing the faint sweetness of the cherry and the lingering scent of Tifa's perfume.

"Maybe…do you think Cloud could talk to him?" he asked, watching Tifa's face tighten with sudden, striking displeasure.

"I'll give him a call and ask him," Tifa said. It was all she could promise. Cloud had, supposedly, moved back in to Seventh Heaven, but spent all of his time at deliveries, avoiding them all. "I'm sorry about Reno. I really like that little rascal."

"Me too," Rude said, draining the glass. "And you, Miss Tifa? You've been looking a little strained—not that you look any less beautiful, mind you."

Tifa smiled indulgently at Rude's flush and flustered backtrack.

"Yeah, well, we've all got our problems, Rude," she sadly said, idly wiping down the shiny, polished bar top. "Some just bother me more than others."

Rude said nothing, his silence as accepting as a question from any other. It was a silence Tifa knew she could count on, a silence that kept secrets secrets and never let those secrets turn his judgment.

"I've got a little problem," she whispered, staring down at the bar as the tears formed. She'd told no one. _No one_—not even Yuffie, not even Vincent, who could never be shocked by anything.

"Miss Tifa," Rude softly said, reaching out to still her furious scrubbing of the bar. His hand was warm and calloused, so capable and strong. "Please…you can trust me. I hate to see you in pain like this."

The whole of her world narrowed to one tiny sentence, a sentence that brought her as much thrilling joy as it did empty despair.

"I'm pregnant."

She waited for his response, wondering if this would finally be what drove Rude away. He'd been so patient with her, so shy, so respectful of her—that he had feelings for her was no secret, and she hated like everything to abuse those feelings. But this was a secret that wouldn't keep for long, and she preferred telling him herself to just letting him stumble upon it one day. Her honesty demanded nothing less of her, and her pride wouldn't allow her to let herself off easy.

"Miss Tifa," he finally said, and his deep voice was slow, measuring. The hand on hers pulled away and Tifa closed her eyes, sure that he was abandoning her. Sure that she deserved it. What had she done in the face of his quiet, steady love? She'd piled guilt on an already guilt-laden Cloud and all but forced him into her bed. She couldn't blame anyone else for her predicament, she'd brought all of this upon herself and she knew it. "I know that I'm not worthy to even ask…"

She looked up and saw him fishing something out of his jacket pocket, his eyes inscrutable behind the mirrored lenses of his sunglasses.

"But would you do me the very great honor of becoming my wife?"

Spots swam before Tifa's eyes as he withdrew a small box and opened it, only the slight trembling of his hands betraying how nervous he was. The ring inside was beautiful, a tasteful and elegant diamond that was as understated as the man who held it.

"I know we have been enemies in the past, but I care for you and your children," Rude said, offering the ring to her with one hand, the other daring to reach out and lightly touch a wisp of her hair. He'd never touched her before, he'd always respected her too much to take liberties with her person. "I would be honored to be your husband and care for you and your children. Please, Miss Tifa, say yes…"

"Rude…" she softly said, overwhelmed. Smiling gently, she carefully tugged his sunglasses off, smiling to see his anxious, amber-colored eyes fastened to hers. "You do _me_ the honor. Don't you even want to know who the father is?"

Rude shrugged a little, the movement moving his broad shoulders beneath the clean lines of his suit.

"If I am the baby's father, does it matter?" he asked, the situation black and white to him. "Does it matter who Denzel's father is? Doesn't love make a family?"

"Do you love me, Rude?" Tifa gently asked, needing to hear it before she gave him her answer.

"Do you even need to ask?" the gruff Turk asked, shifting a little in discomfit. "I've loved you for a very long time, Miss Tifa. And I'm certain that, with time, you'll come to love me, too—and forget whoever it was who has broken your heart. Will you say yes?"

Breathlessly overcome, warm tears of happiness spilling from her eyes, Tifa flung her arms around Rude's thick neck and sobbed, "Yes! Of _course_ yes!"

Rude's sigh of relief was as strong as the arms that held her so securely, asking so little, and giving so much.


	27. Eulogy For the Damned

Reno looked up from his drink to see Cloud coming towards him in the smoky bar. He groaned when the man sat down across from him and asked, "Oh, what are _you_ doing here? Wasn't a resurrection enough attention for you?"

Indeed, Cloud had become a rather legendary individual, post-resurrection. Though as far as Reno was concerned, it made him a goddamned _zombie_. _Gross_!

"Tifa asked me to come and talk to you," Cloud said in his usual deadpan.

"_Tifa_?" Damn Rude, anyway! "Look, the last thing I need is Mr. Social Ineptitude chasing off all of the chicks, yo!"

The waitress put another drink in front of Reno and a glass of water down in front of Cloud. Reno snatched his up without so much as a thank you.

"Thanks," Cloud pointedly said, giving her a tight smile.

Reno scowled. The waitress left quickly.

"You're slipping, Reno," Cloud said. "Tifa tells me that Rufus gave you enforced leave."

Reno grinned and took another pull off of his cigarette before gulping a little more of the numbing alcohol.

"Seriously—"

"As if you could be anything _but_," Reno cut in, tipping his glass in mock salute of Cloud's nonexistent sense of humor.

"—what was he to you?" Cloud finished, ignoring Reno's comment.

Reno sighed heavily, his drunken body swaying a little where he sat.

_Yazoo_. How had Rude known? And why send Cloud?

His face a study in misery, he softly asked, "What _wasn't_ he?"

Cloud merely gazed at him, probably trying to think.

"They did terrible things," Cloud said, struggling to find the best way to convey his thoughts.

Reno nodded, accepting this.

"But they weren't bad people, Reno," Cloud said, surprising him into looking at the man. "Kadaj did what he did because he needed his Mother to love him. And the others did what they did because they loved Kadaj and wanted him to be happy. However much terror and fear they brought to the people around them, they only did it out of love for one another.

"They were raised in ShinRa labs, Reno. You work for them, you know what goes on in those places. So how could we expect them to love this world? What had it given them outside of misery, rejection, and pain? Don't judge them too harshly, and don't judge yourself too harshly…"

Very, very softly, very sadly, Cloud whispered, "We don't choose who we love."

Reno gave him a sharp look, wondering what brought that peculiar grief to shroud Cloud's Siamese-cat face.

"No, I guess we don't, yo," he agreed, not sure how to respond, kind of desperate for Cloud to leave because he was starting to draw quite a crowd and Reno wanted a little peace and quiet for his drinking binge. "But we can decide if we wanna go on without 'em, can't we? Fuck it…"

He gave his cup a long, assessing look and grinned a little before he tipped it back, washing down the bitterness with a soothing burn.

"…I'm going to hell anyways, right?"

Cloud said nothing, merely looked at him with those too-big eyes, as solemn and unreachable as always.

"We ain't friends, yo," Reno reminded him. "Maybe you'd best get movin' on."

"I'll go," Cloud murmured, blinking slowly at him—just like a damned cat! Just needed a collar with a bell on it…"Just remember what I said, Reno. The world has a lot more to offer than death."

Reno hiccoughed and nodded, smiling lazily, swaying in his seat, slurring, "Yeah, _yeah_, I ain't the self-sacrificing type…tell Miss Boobs I said congratulations."

Cloud raised a quizzical brow, making Reno laugh harshly.

"So," he chuckled. "She didn't tell you, huh? _Funny_, that Tifa. See ya, yo, watch out for dogs."

Cloud puzzled over that for a second, clearly not equating himself to a cross-eyed feline, and finally left with a vague wave, moving through the crowd with tight grace and a clear displeasure of strangers touching him.

Soured by the meeting, Reno paid his tab and staggered home. Not drunk enough to sleep and bored by pretty much everything, he fumbled for his phone, reading the text that Rude had sent him.

'Are you ok?' was all it asked, and Reno laughed mirthlessly at it. He was anything _but_ okay.

He flopped down on his couch, erasing the message, getting lost in the menu. On impulse he scrolled through his call log, erasing each as he went as a way to pass the time. All of the names were familiar, and then he came upon just a number. Frowning, he tried to place it, and looked at the date.

He remembered the date because of everything that had happened. Kadaj, the children, the hideous monster, the explosion that he'd taken such dark, ugly joy in. _Yazoo_. It was the number of Kadaj, Yazoo's kook brother. He remembered the boy had called late afternoon, just an hour or so after Yazoo's Primo Asshole boyfriend had called.

_That _thought made him scowl, and he moved on, erasing a call from Tifa, another from Rufus.

And then the same number.

Puzzled, Reno could only stare at it. A date check showed him it was the same day, an hour or so before Kadaj had called him. Same number. Same day. Now why, _why_ would baby-Sephiroth and Primo Asshole boyfriend be using the same fucking phone?

'_Because baby brother couldn't pull off older, mean boyfriend, so he passed it off to big brother, you goddamned _moron!' Reno's inner dialogue gladly informed him, fitting all of the pieces together nice and tight.

He sat bolt-upright on the couch, heart thundering and a slow, welling fear creeping over him.

The big one, he remembered now how familiar that voice had been. He hadn't spoken the whole time he was at Rufus'—neither of them really had, they'd let Kadaj do all the ranting. But when he'd spoken in the square Reno had recognized his voice and immediately sacrificed it to the monster of his anger. Big boy had pretended to be Yazoo's 'boyfriend.'

"Oh my god," Reno breathed, dropping the phone and shoving his hands into his hair.

Like any other person trying desperately to salvage what was left of their dignity, Yazoo had let his brothers call and give Reno a lie that was sure to shut him up in lieu of exposing himself to further abuse.

And Reno had blasted him sky-high with a vicious, ugly feeling of vindication.

"I laughed when I killed him," he whispered, appalled, remembering what must've been Yazoo's last glimpse of life—his own cold, cruel smile.

'_I've never lied to you…_'

Christ, he hadn't, had he? No boyfriend, no subtle attempts to garner information—he clearly recalled how utterly shocked Yazoo had been when he'd mentioned he worked for ShinRa. How Yazoo had resisted seeing him again. Not the actions of someone willing to seduce for information. Fuck, Yazoo had been the one to hold back at first, unwilling to allow Reno to do something he might regret.

And he'd repaid him, boy-howdy. He'd left him hanging and, when Yazoo had attempted to distance himself, Reno had killed him, smiling while he did it.

"I laughed when I killed someone I…someone I…"

To admit it would break what remained of him, and with Yazoo gone there was so very, very little.

For the first time in his memory, Reno ducked his head in shame and cried bitter, silent tears.

'_Yazoo, you didn't deserve what I did to you…_' he thought, horrified to the depths of his soul.

If anyone was going to hell, it was Reno.

He was sure of it now.


	28. Resurrection

Such bright, wonderful light!

_Kadaj_!

_Mother!_

She laughed when he called her that, giggling, the crackling energy of her touching him, tickling him until he laughed with her. And still it couldn't quite dispel that tether within him, that pull to something beyond himself.

She laughed again and plucked it like a string, awakening a deep longing inside of him.

_Kadaj, you remember, don't you?_

Cloud. How could he forget? The ache of love vibrated out from that tether, drawn tight and taut. He remembered just before the light, he remembered telling Cloud that he loved him.

_I promised him I would never leave him._

Again that giggle, abandoned and sweet as a child's.

He felt his brothers near him. Loz utterly enchanted—so many people to play with! And Yazoo, the melancholy still so heavy within him. He always responded to her attempts to comfort him, but there was a sadness in him that even death could not erase.

_We can't keep every promise, Kadaj…but he loves you so very much…_

Kadaj reached for his brothers, needing the comfort of their presence. Her warm, loving lips pressed to his forehead, a kiss of blessing. He'd felt so clean in this place, all of the terror and horror of his past erased with the chime of her sweet laughter. All was joy here…but for the longing that drew him time and again to memories of Cloud.

_I did it for him because I love him…If I can do it for one, I can do it for three more…_

_Mother?_

Again that carefree laughter, teasing and light.

_They need you so much, don't they? But the choice is yours…_

_I don't understand!_

There was a hint of panic there, he held tightly to his brothers.

_Don't worry_, was the laughing, delighted response. _You'll be back, and we'll be waiting, and we'll all be here together…_

_Mother!_

The light was fading, she felt so far away.

_Love with all your heart, all of you_, was her faint advice, pure joy in that sweet voice.

"Mother?" he breathed, and tasted air, fresh and clean and full of life.

And then came a soft, amused whisper in his ear, '_Open your eyes, Kadaj_.'

He opened his eyes slowly.

And saw bright, vibrant blue.

It was the color of the sky, the color of sapphires in strong light, the myriad, shifting colors of the sea.

It was Cloud's glowing mako-eyes.

And he was smiling…

"She said to wait for you," he softly said, crouched at the edge of the water in the abandoned church. He slipped off his glove and extended one strong, corded arm, his bare hand palm-up, his fingers gently bent and open in waiting. "Kadaj. Welcome home."

Half laughing and half crying, Kadaj grasped that offered hand, those slender, strong fingers closing around his and drawing him up, up and out of the water, naked as the day he was born.

But then, this _was_ the day he was born, wasn't it?

He grinned at Cloud as the solemn man gently scooped him up, folding him into an embrace that spoke volumes. Heartbeat to heartbeat, they rested in each others embrace. When Cloud pulled back to look at him, his solemn face transformed, gentle and soft. As gentle and soft as the lips that pressed to his in a welcoming kiss.

More would come, he knew it with surety—they had found each other. She had done this for them, given them a second chance…

"Come on," Cloud said, smiling over Kadaj's shoulder. "I've got some clothes for you."

Kadaj turned his head and saw Loz and Yazoo hip-deep in the pool, clinging to each other like lost children, their green eyes huge and frightened.

"How did she do this?" Kadaj whispered, clinging to his neck, pressing kisses to his jaw, astounded to the depths of himself.

Cloud merely smiled and said, "She always was a bit of a mystery."

He stood, setting Kadaj gently down on his bare, slender feet, one hand lingering on the boy's hip as if reluctant to break contact. He held his other hand out to Yazoo and urged him forward, saying, "It's alright, you'll see. Everything is going to be fine…"

Hesitantly, the pair moved forward, Yazoo taking Cloud's hand with only a moment of hesitation, Loz boosting him up and then climbing out himself. His brothers seemed shell-shocked, mute with it, dripping and shivering and touchingly vulnerable.

But everything would be alright now, Kadaj was sure of it. The madness was gone, though he knew he'd probably still be a jealous, temperamental, spiteful bitch—just as he knew Cloud would probably expect no less than that from him. It might not be easy, but he had Cloud.

And that was worth _anything_.

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**A/N: Hey, I figured Aerith couldn't be **_**that**_** much of a bitch, right? What's that phrase, if you love something, set it free? Yeah. Well, more to come—no story is complete without a little Reunion sex. Oh, and if you don't like my resurrection plotline I'm sorry, you can stop any time you like, right?**


	29. Reunion

**A/N: Well, it's been a long, hard road, my love, but we've almost made it through this fanfic of epic proportions. Thank you for your patience and your interest, I hope you've enjoyed this as much as I have! If so, by all means feel free to drop me a review!**

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'Will you just go see him? _Please_?'

Yazoo hugged himself, at odds once more. Tifa had been so insistent, practically begging him. Though he'd only been back for two days, he'd already managed to find a place in the loving and exuberant woman's affections. She and Loz got on like a house on fire, surprisingly enough—a fire fed by Loz's unfailing interest in alcohol and all its various combinations. He was shaping up to be quite the bartender, and Tifa didn't mind his muscle around one bit.

The wind tugged at his loose shirt—a tee-shirt Tifa had loaned him. He had nothing of his own. Even his jeans and shoes belonged to Cloud, who promised to get them all settled, though he'd done little more than lock himself away with Kadaj. Yazoo could hardly blame them, they were in love and reunited, what could be better than that?

He wouldn't even be roaming the cold, gloomy streets if Tifa hadn't managed to get to him

"He's changed," she'd sadly said, her chocolate-brown eyes heavy with sorrow. "He drinks all of the time…he doesn't want to see anyone or talk to anyone, he's even been forced to stay away from work until he pulls himself together. He's not _Reno_ anymore…and I think it's because he misses you…"

Yazoo had tried to explain to her exactly why it _couldn't_ be him, unless Reno was just _that_ sickened by what Yazoo had led him to do. She had listened with an open mind, saying she'd assumed as much from what her fiancé had said, and then she'd proceeded to prick at his conscience until he'd taken to the streets just to escape.

He guessed that he could find Reno and give the man a chance to clock him one. Reno may have tried to kill him, but he surely had his reasons and Yazoo needed no explanations—who was he, after all, but an embarrassment? A lover who never should have been? Surely seeing him again would only evoke more of that vile disgust he'd already seen so much of…

Sighing, Yazoo glanced around and caught a flash of red ahead of him. No one else had that vivid shade of hair, surely.

Cautiously, he crept up, watching from afar, using the bustling crowd to hide himself.

Reno paused ahead of him, turning as he did so, his face lifted to read the shop sign.

Yazoo bit his lip, feeling his heart ache to see Reno's fox-face so gaunt and drawn. He looked like he hadn't slept in days, dark circles leaving shadows beneath the unhealthy, feverish glitter of those big blue eyes. His suit hung from his lanky frame, looking too heavy and harsh for him to hold up. He looked like absolute hell.

And Yazoo wanted desperately to hold him, despite everything.

He moved forward, hesitating with indecision when Reno went inside. Torn between staying and going, Yazoo managed to be in mid-decision when Reno emerged from the coffee shop, cup in hand and cigarette dangling from his lip.

He glanced up, his shadowed blue eyes fixing on Yazoo's own jade ones.

"Reno…" he helplessly said, suddenly afraid, not sure if he could bear the rejection again, his arms crossing protectively over his chest.

Reno's mouth dropped open, his lax hand releasing the cup of coffee.

Before either cigarette or cup could hit the ground, he was dragging Yazoo into his embrace, burying his face in the crook of Yazoo's neck, his arms so tight they squeezed the breath out of him.

"Reno," he breathed, wrapping his arms around that slender, too-thin body, breathing in the cigarette and alcohol smell of him like it was the most delicious scent ever made. "Reno, I…"

"Shut up, lady," Reno sharply said, his hold tightening. He pulled back to look down into Yazoo's face and the grin that tugged at his lips was one hundred percent Reno, if only a little worn at the edges from pain and loss. His voice shook a little when he teased, "Where've you been, beautiful? I've been waiting half a year, yo."

"Idiot," Yazoo laughed, unexpectedly moved to cup that sharp little fox face.

Reno laughed—startled, absolutely joyful, belly deep laughter that brought tears to his shining blue eyes. He cradled Yazoo to his chest and kissed him with utter abandon, hungry and afraid and desperate to confirm with his senses that Yazoo was _alive_, that he was _here_.

Yazoo kissed him back, breathless with it, panting a little when Reno drew back with that familiar, cocky grin plastered on his face.

"People are staring," Yazoo told him, still worried, still unsure just what had pushed Reno so far from him.

"Let 'em, they're just jealous 'cause I got the hottest girlfriend around," Reno quipped, his own breathing none too steady, his hold on Yazoo only tightening.

"I'm not a girl, idiot," Yazoo fondly said, relief flooding over him. "_Everyone else _knows that."

"I don't care what they know," Reno said, eyes dancing in delight. "What do I care, so long as I get to go home with the hottie, yo?"

"You're incorrigible," Yazoo laughed, leaning up to kiss him again, ignoring the blatant stares. Perhaps Edge didn't often see two grown men making up in public. Teasingly, he whispered in Reno's ear, "Open your mouth again and I'll stick my cock in it. _No kidding_."

Reno pulled back a bit, his sparkling, gleeful eyes full of mischief, and—very deliberately—he opened his mouth.

"Your place," Yazoo said, slapping him lightly until he grinned.

"My place it is, yo," Reno said, arms still around his waist as he steered Yazoo down the street, grinning so widely he had even more the look of a wily fox.

"Fox face," Yazoo sighed, leaning against him as they walked, more happy than he could ever recall being.

"Housewife," Reno retorted.

"I beg your pardon?" Yazoo said, startled.

Reno laughed and said, "You'll be begging _something_—don't think I forgot about those handcuffs. We're heading straight for the shower, yo!"

Yazoo laughed, pleased and amazed at the change in his lover.

"Do you love me, baby?" Reno asked, pausing at the stoop of his apartment to pull Yazoo into his embrace.

"Idiot," Yazoo sighed, kissing his beautiful mouth. "Of _course_ I do."

"That's my girl," Reno said, unlocking the door.

"I'm _not_ a _girl_!" was Yazoo's exasperated, laughing reply.

"Whatever you say, woman," Reno told him, grinning and holding the door open for him. "Ladies first."

Groaning in amused annoyance, Yazoo entered the apartment, only to pause and turn when Reno called, "Hey, lady."

He lifted a brow in inquiry, and returned Reno's infectious grin when the lanky, red-headed man said, "I love you, too."


	30. Bad Little Boys!

**A/N: These last few chapters are for all of you who have so patiently waded through the rather daunting mess of this story. Thank you for all of your reviews and support and ideas! And please, enjoy these last few chapters, it's the least I can do, I did promise you all Reunion sex, and I am a creature of my word.**

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Kadaj turned his freshly retrieved bike off, glad to see Cloud's _Fenrir_ parked in its usual spot outside of Seventh Heaven. The man had said he'd close down shop for the next two days or so, giving himself a break from running deliveries. Cloud had some things to take care of before he could start back up again—mainly, figuring out what to do about their living situation. Kadaj wasn't sure, but he had the suspicion that Tifa didn't like him too well—understandably enough—and wasn't entirely comfortable with him living under her roof.

He swung gracefully off of the bike and headed in through the front door, smiling to see Loz busily at work behind the bar washing glasses, his face a mask of concentration. The older man looked up and Kadaj mouthed silently, "Tifa?" To which Loz shook his head and tilted it pointedly at the stairs. Morning sickness again. _Yuck_.

He crept silently up the first few risers, waiting to hear any signs of life. Barrett had swept Marlene away just before they'd arrived, and the little boy Denzel kept his distance, afraid of Kadaj no matter what he did—which irritated Tifa to no end. Funny, she didn't seem to have any problem with Loz, and he was the one who had whipped the shit out of her. And as far as Yazoo went, well, Tifa couldn't have been anymore obvious if she made him wear a sign proclaiming him her favorite.

"…yeah, we'll come look at it today at four, thank you for your time…"

His keen little ears picked up Cloud's low, soft voice and he quickly skimmed up the few more stairs to the landing, ducking into the office/bedroom that belonged to Cloud to see the man lounging in the chair at his desk, listening intently to someone yapping at him over the phone.

Kadaj tossed his backpack down on the floor and hastily pulled his fingers through his hair, hoping he didn't look a mess. He didn't—he looked absolutely lovely, the cool air bringing a soft pink blush to his cheeks and darkening the soft pout of his lips, making his jade green eyes sparkle with health and youth.

"…yeah, I appreciate it," Cloud said, glancing around to see who had come in and solemnly looking Kadaj over, frank appreciation on his serious face. "See you then. Bye."

"Hey, I got my bike back!" Kadaj said, dropping smoothly into Cloud's lap in his borrowed clothes. "Who was that?"

"Apartment manager," Cloud said, his bare hands settling on Kadaj's hips as the boy twisted a little like a lithe cat to face him. "I wondered where you'd gone off to."

"Jealous?" Kadaj teased, smirking. "You gotta watch me, brother—never know what I might do."

"Well, you _are_ remarkably unpredictable," Cloud murmured, and Kadaj grinned, understanding Cloud's rather complex and subtle sense of humor. "And you have to stop calling me that."

"What, 'brother'?" Kadaj asked, laughing lightly and bouncing out of his lap only to straddle him, slim legs folded up at his sides. "Pervert."

"Don't start," Cloud warned, a faint smile curving his lips.

"Pedo—"

Cloud kissed him to shut him up, and Kadaj laughed into his mouth, sighing because nothing felt quite like Cloud's kisses, quite like his warm mouth and his wet, skillful tongue.

"—phile," he finished softly, though the age of consent was sixteen and he figured himself somewhere around there. None of them had a birthday, but Yazoo and Loz always somehow knew when the time of year was that Kadaj had been brought to them, and reckoned that to be his birthday—and that had passed while they were…away…

Cloud sighed, those huge blue eyes blinking in that slow, sultry way of his.

"I heard Tifa talking to Yazoo, is he still here?" Cloud asked.

"Why?" Kadaj asked, feeling an irrational twinge of jealousy. Perspective had changed his perception of his brothers and he had to admit that Yazoo was even more femininely beautiful than he himself, because Yazoo was past that awkward phase. Not that Kadaj was at all awkward, but he was as plagued now by self-doubt as he'd ever been. His slender brows drawing low, he sat back in Cloud's lap and gave him a suspicious look, saying, "_I_ don't know—why don't you go look if you're so concerned?"

Cloud had the patience of a saint where Kadaj's mood swings were concerned, but didn't particularly indulge them. As with any petulant child, Cloud had generally found that simply walking away and ignoring Kadaj brought the behavior to a screeching halt and it was usually followed by a bout of angelic behavior that, frankly, made him suspicious as hell.

"_You_ should be concerned, you spiteful little cat," Cloud gently chided him. "Yazoo has been hurting, or haven't you noticed?"

"Of course I noticed!" Kadaj snapped, working himself into a pout. "He's my brother! We're very close!"

Cloud tilted his gorgeous face, merely gazing at Kadaj with amused and sparkling eyes.

"Stop it!" he hissed, giving him an annoyed glare.

"Stop what?" Cloud asked, smiling a little.

"Stop making me not upset with you!" Kadaj fiercely said.

"Why should you be upset with me?" Cloud reasonably asked. "I've been here all morning trying to track down an apartment and wishing you were here…"

His sullen mood evaporating in seconds, Kadaj pitched forward in Cloud's lap and clung to his neck, delighted that his brother was sitting there in only a loose pair of pants and that pink ribbon around his corded arm. He nuzzled his nose into Cloud's tender throat and gave it a bite, his hand sliding appreciatively down the rippled expanse of Cloud's taut belly.

"I take it you're not upset anymore?" Cloud teased, those arms going around him, hand slipping beneath the loose tail of Kadaj's borrowed shirt to skim along the bare skin of his back, lifting goose bumps in his wake.

"Mmmmm," Kadaj sighed, and bit him harder, lapping at the delicious taste of him with his tongue. Another hard nip and Cloud shifted a little under him, jaw tightening with a wince and a sudden hard heat swelling up beneath his loose pants. Kadaj shifted, pressing against it, rolling his hips up, his stroking hands scoring Cloud's pale flesh with sharp little nails until the man hissed, suddenly pulsingly hard.

"Kadaj," he breathed, tearing that soft, biting mouth away from his throat and pulling the boy back to take in his dreamy, beautiful face. "We keep this up and it's bound to hurt you…"

Kadaj smiled and licked his lips, whispering, "Mmmm…hurt me…"

He was rewarded with a long, sweet shudder of Cloud's body, those blue eyes darkening with the coming of his lust. He wasn't afraid of it anymore, and never pushed Kadaj past what he could endure, though he tread the boundary _very_ closely.

"Are you mine?" Cloud asked, those slowly stroking hands somehow managing to slip Kadaj's loose shirt down and off, brushing down his belly and up his chest, so large and strong against his lean body. "Who do you belong to, Kadaj? I need to hear it."

Kadaj smiled to see the beast rising, that dark part of Cloud he so easily accepted now, making Cloud as violent, passionate, unpredictable, and madly jealous as Kadaj.

"I belong to you, Cloud," Kadaj said, pulling out all the stops, his face utterly sensual, his posture welcoming—he hadn't lost a trick, and he used them all to entice the beast to devour him. Who needed mercy when such pleasure could be found in cruelty? "Only to _you_…"

Cloud smiled a little and leaned into him, breathing into his ear, "Then why are you still dressed?"

Kadaj laughed, an echo of the madness he'd been cleansed of. He swung out of Cloud's lap with all the lithe grace of a stripper, shedding his borrowed clothes as he backed to the bed, Cloud standing and following in his wake, those blue eyes swallowed by darkness and a soft, predatory smile on his face. Kadaj thrilled to see it—Cloud had told him of the beast, naming the thing Kadaj had sensed inside him, and that it wanted only Kadaj made the boy shiver with power and pleasure. To be coveted by Cloud, to be devoured in such a way…it was everything that he had always craved and more.

Cloud advanced on him, one corded arm shooting out to close the door firmly. There was no need to lock it, no one would dare to disturb them.

Kadaj suppressed a whimper of need, swaying towards Cloud, his slender body trembling. Cloud reached out and stroked his cheek from a distance, breathing, "So beautiful, Kadaj. And you know it so well…almost too well at times."

Kadaj's eyes swept closed and he felt the familiar, delicious fear curling up from his belly. He trusted that Cloud would never purposefully hurt him, but he also knew—as a creature well acquainted with madness—that this side of Cloud might not be able to help himself. Passion was just another form of madness, after all…as was love.

"Have you been good, Kadaj?" Cloud purred, his voice lowering to a throaty purr, the rumbling, raspy sound of growling wolf.

He frantically shook his head in the negative, eyes squeezed closed. Even if he'd claimed to be good the punishment would still come—only it might not be enough.

Cloud chuckled, the sound full of affection and dark delight.

"Are you _lying_ to me, little boy?"

Kadaj's eyes fluttered open and he smiled that sensual, rather cruel smile. He licked his pale pink lips and fastened his gaze on Cloud's mouth, whispering, "And what if I _am_?"

Cloud moved suddenly, tossing the laughing boy over his shoulder and dumping him on the squeaky mattress to a chorus of rusted springs complaining. Kadaj laughed and laughed, wriggling to escape, fighting because it felt _good_ to fight and made Cloud that much more aggressive. His hard, right hand cracked down on Kadaj's round little bottom, earning a gasp and a redoubled effort to escape. He twisted, biting the arm braced on the mattress, wriggling to evade the striking hand that found him so accurately.

"Feisty," Cloud laughed, rolling Kadaj up on himself and pushing him fully onto the mattress. He left the boy panting and giggling to go dig through his trunks, Kadaj watching him with breathless, wary interest. When he pulled out a worn leather belt Kadaj felt a jolt that went straight to his groin. He got another jolt when a second belt emerged, his blood boiling when Cloud lazily walked back over to him. It was a joy just to watch him move in that slow, lion-like way, the muscles of his belly rippling beneath his pearlescent skin, that intense look of desire and amusement on his gorgeous face. Kadaj found his breath quickening, his pulse thrumming.

"Come here," Cloud breathed.

Kadaj sat up on the edge of the bed in silent, breathless awe.

"Open your mouth," Cloud told him.

His pale jade eyes fixed to Cloud's, Kadaj opened his mouth, knowing how compelling and sensual the movement was. Kadaj opened his mouth like that, and men dreamed of filling it, they just couldn't help themselves.

Cloud pulled the length of the thinner belt through his hands and put it between Kadaj's teeth, buckling the belt snugly at the back of his head and easily tucking in the excess.

Kadaj had a moment of panic when he realized Cloud had gagged him. Games were fun and pain was fun too but not being able to cry "enough" was something that scared him. He looked up into those blue eyes and saw Cloud staring down at him with love and the hint of tenderness, remiknding Kadaj that the beast was just an extension of Cloud and that Cloud loved him far too much to do him true damage. He bit down on the leather and shuddered a little, easily submitting to it.

Cloud hefted him and turned him around, bending him over the metal frame of the baseboard. He put Kadaj's little hands on the edge of the mattress and whispered, "Hold on," pressing a quick, biting kiss to his cheek.

Kadaj shivered again and moaned when the belt snapped over his exposed bottom, his teeth clenching on the belt in his mouth and his head lifting, back bowing prettily.

"Sh," Cloud soothed, smoothing his hand over the fading welt. A second later another blow followed, Cloud falling into a rhythm that showed him to be no novice at whipping people. And with every blow Kadaj felt rocked to his core, his body swaying in unconscious time with those blows, his cock swelling against the metal bed-frame and jutting up between the bars. "Quite the hungry little thing, aren't we?"

The amusement in his voice burned Kadaj with sweetness, made him writhe more beneath the force of those blows. Cloud nudge his feet wider apart and dropped the belt in favor of his hand, spanking Kadaj's bottom and inner thighs with hard, expert slaps.

Kadaj's breath was coming in panting little gasps, his teeth clenched so tightly on the leather that he was sure he would bite right through it.

And then one hard, knowing hand reached around to pull his cock up and out while the other hand came up between his legs to place a slap on his balls that had just enough pressure to make him writhe.

"Don't cum," Cloud warned him, purring in his ear, hot as a firebrand against his back.

Kadaj held back, sobbing a little in frustration, the pleasure singing through his senses. That hard hand released him and Cloud shoved him onto the bed on his back, moving over him like liquid. He'd shed his loose pants and was gloriously naked, the impressive length of his cock full and hard, his tip oozing the faintest trace of precum.

Kadaj wanted to lick it off, and whimpered around the belt.

"Sh," Cloud said again, shoving Kadaj's hands up to grip the headboard. Again, he warned, "Don't cum."

His hard, delicious mouth tasted every inch of Kadaj's flesh, and the boy nearly came out of his skin when Cloud greedily sucked him down, his own cock twitching with every one of Kadaj's whimpers. Kadaj's eyes crossed with the effort of not giving in to that sucking mouth, his climax dangerously close, his hips quaking beneath Cloud's hard, pinning hands.

"Perfect," Cloud said, pulling back. Again, he slid his arms around Kadaj and rolled with him, putting the boy on top. Kadaj was glad of the gag when Cloud lifted him and impaled him, the sensation so great he almost burst with it, the gag muffling his frantic, harsh cries.

"Sh, almost," Cloud whispered, sliding in with excruciating slowness until Kadaj settled onto his groin, his little arms braced against Cloud's upper belly. He gave the boy's round rump a hard slap and fiercely whispered, "Ride me, Kadaj."

Kadaj sobbed harshly and rode him for all he was worth, working himself up and down on that wet length, writhing with every pulse of it inside him. He needed Cloud's permission badly, his whole body sparking with the need to climax and soon it would reach the point when there would be no choice.

"That's it," Cloud hissed, his eyes intense and fixed on Kadaj's frantically working body. And then he gave Kadaj an invitation that made him clench hard. "_Jerk off for me, little boy_."

Kadaj arched his back and madly grabbed his straining cock, pumping it in one little hand while Cloud watched with fascinated, eager enjoyment, his breath quickening and his cock twitching inside Kadaj's slim body. He was close, so close, and Kadaj knew it by the tightening of his body and that dangerous look in his eyes.

Kadaj's eyes rolled back in his head and he felt it ripping up through his balls, a searing and amazing pleasure ready to burst forth.

"_Cum for me_."

His back arched hard and he screamed against the gag, grinding wildly down on Cloud's spurting cock as his own jetted viscous ropes of cum up Cloud's belly and chest. It was an utterly mind-blowing orgasm and Kadaj rocked on Cloud's stiff cock for a pleasurable eternity, milking the orgasm for all it was worth, both of them lost in the climax.

Finally, drained beyond belief, he weakly slumped forward, his head bowed and his breathing ragged.

Cloud's own breathing was harsh and uneven, gradually slowing. He reached up with gentle fingers and unbuckled the belt, drawing it gently from Kadaj's mouth and tossing it away.

"Here, let me see," he murmured, tipping the boy's head up, and tenderly touching the corners of his mouth, searching for breaks where the leather might've cut into his tender skin.

Kadaj felt unbidden tears well up at this gentle expression of Cloud's love. Even wrapped in blinding, mindless pleasure, the man still worried that he'd given Kadaj some kind of unintentional pain.

"Cloud," he warbled, his voice thick with emotion. "I love you so much."

Cloud smiled at him, those blue eyes sweeping slowly closed and opening back up to gaze at him with consuming affection. He pulled Kadaj down against his well-formed chest, sealing their bodies with the boy's sticky cum, and held him tight. Kadaj snuggled against him, feeling Cloud's pulse pound beneath his cheek, an answering pulse in the cock that still filled him. He felt Cloud nuzzle the crown of his head, and cried silent, joyful tears when the man whispered, "I love you, too, Kadaj."


	31. Finally Home!

**WARNING: the previously mentioned promise is kept in this chapter, so if you got a problem with kink (urine in particular), best be off. Just remember, my dears, that it's perfectly sterile.**

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'_I love you, too_.'

Those words echoed through Yazoo's quivering little soul, chasing away the last of the melancholy that had plagued him even in death. He lifted his arms in welcome as Reno closed and locked his apartment door, sliding them around the tall man's slender, strong shoulders and melting into his warm embrace.

"God, I missed you!" Reno breathed, inhaling the scent of his skin, crushing him so close—as if he could somehow draw Yazoo into himself and always have him so near. "Please don't ever leave me again, baby, okay?"

"Never," Yazoo gladly promised, and pulled back to look at his beloved, concerned fox-face. "Don't you know how much I missed you? While I was…_gone_…I couldn't rest, I couldn't move on—all I wanted was you, Reno. I'm so sorry that I hurt you, I'm so sorry for everything I did wrong—"

"Don't!" Reno sharply said, his voice strangled and his hand clamping down over Yazoo's lips. He took a shaky breath and tried to soften his reaction, sadly saying, "Of the two of us, Yazoo, _I'm_ the one who has a lot to answer for…"

Yazoo smiled and pushed his hand away, gently suggesting, "Why don't we just forget it? Both of us had our reasons…"

Reno's sad eyes lifted, hope and happiness shining in their vivid blue depths. He gave Yazoo a crooked smile and softly said, "That's a great idea, yo."

They kissed again, and there was no hesitance, no reticence on Reno's part. Whatever issues Yazoo had thought he'd had, he'd abandoned them completely—Reno wanted Yazoo, wanted him badly. Those slender but so strong hands pulled Yazoo tightly to his belly, settling on his hips to hold him up against his groin.

"God, I forgot how goddamned _hot_ you are, lady!" Reno said, breaking the kiss to grin at him.

"And I forgot you always wear those stupid goggles," Yazoo mused, smirking at him and pulling them off, his voice teasing. "And what's with this suit? You look like a mourner at a funeral." He pushed Reno's hands down and shoved his jacket off, letting it drop to the floor. He dipped his fingers down the open collar of Reno's dress shirt, parting the cloth, and happily sighed, "There, _that's_ better."

Reno's shiver when Yazoo touched his bare skin didn't escape him, and Yazoo thrilled with the knowledge that he could affect his lover so much. The thought that his fox-face had been with others after him upset Yazoo, but he pushed the thought away—it was the past, and he had no room to judge.

That lean, beautiful face was tilted down to gaze him, Reno's huge blue eyes even more vibrant with that smudge of darkness beneath. Yazoo smiled slowly up at him, letting his green eyes slide almost closed in a way that had Reno's pulse jumping.

"God, I wanna cum on your face!" he said, and was suddenly, urgently tugging at Yazoo's clothes, cursing hilariously at the belt that kept Yazoo's loose pants secured above the curve of his hip.

"Let _me_," Yazoo laughed, so happy to be back with this ridiculous, wonderful man. Had he ever laughed so much before? Only, perhaps, when Kadaj had been a toddling baby and still full of a child's wonder at the world—all of their laughter had been so dark, with such an edge of cruelty. Yazoo was glad that Reno had taught him how beloved and light laughter could be.

"Hurry it up, yo! I've been waiting too long!" Reno scolded, watching him undress even as he skimmed out of his shirt and shed the rest of his clothing, whistling appreciatively at Yazoo's bare, toned body. "Get over here, lady—you're giving me bad ideas."

"_Good_," Yazoo murmured, sliding into his arms, noting with some sadness how Reno's naturally lean body was that much more slender with abuse. He hadn't reached the sharp, gaunt look of hunger yet, but it was obvious the man hadn't been too interested in either food or sleep for awhile.

Reno sucked on his throat and got both palms full of Yazoo's taut backside, rolling his hips up tight against the other man's so that Yazoo moaned and arched, feeling how full and hot he was. There was no flinching now, no drawing back, just an answering groan from the mouth fastened to his skin. Yazoo slid his hand down the dips and hollows of Reno's slender side, pulling his hips back enough to slip his hot palm around Reno's pulsing cock.

Reno gasped and his fingers clenched on Yazoo's bottom, his unsteady voice urgently saying, "Bathroom. _Now_."

Yazoo grinned, shivering in delight and ecstatic that Reno actually wanted to go through with it—there were so many men in the world who balked at the slightest request that it had been _ages_ since Yazoo had relished such sweet capitulation. That Reno was more than aroused by the idea just hammered home Yazoo's amazed and amused realization that there was nothing Reno wouldn't try, nothing that would shock him. That sort of liberating freedom with a lover was heady stuff.

The pair traded rough, frantic kisses as they stumbled their way through Reno's untouched bedroom and into his bathroom. Reno was panting, his eyes wide and excited. Yazoo got a glimpse of himself in the mirror as the man boosted him into the tub and saw that he wasn't much better—he was blushing and his feline eyes were huge and hazy.

"Holy fuck, Yazoo, I'm gonna wear your ass out, yo!" Reno promised, stepping into the tub with him and pinning him against the wall, his quick, deft hands sliding up Yazoo's flesh while they kissed again—all cutting teeth and desperation.

"Hope you got a full bladder, fox-face," Yazoo purred, and tickled his fingers down Reno's straining erection, adding, "And _this_ might be a problem."

"No problem, yo," Reno insisted, sucking on Yazoo's tongue. He pulled back with a gasp and said, "Just lay down all the way."

Yazoo raised an eyebrow in wry inquiry and was rewarded with Reno's full-on cocky grin.

"What?" the man asked, eyes sparkling with amusement. "You think I've never pissed on a gorgeous girl before?"

Yazoo laughed, pleasantly surprised, and slid down Reno's shivering body to lie fully down in his tub, hissing at the cold porcelain burning his skin. Reno stood straddling his feet, gazing down at him with ravenous hunger and that ever-present amusement. He leaned forward and braced his arms against the far end of the shower where Yazoo's head rested, tilting his body so that his erection pointed somewhat less than straight at the ceiling.

Yazoo thought that it was, quite possibly, the hottest thing he'd ever seen, Reno's leanly muscled body so taut, stretched out above him, his smirking fox-face so gorgeous and full of mischief, the long line of his ponytail spilling over his back. Those blue eyes closed for a moment, his smooth brow furrowing in concentration, and when they opened again they were hazy and breathlessly sensual.

"You want it, baby?" he asked, giving Yazoo an impish smile.

"You bet, fox-face," Yazoo breathed, heart thundering, so aroused that this just might set him off.

Reno's left hand forced his cock down and his breath came out in a low, moaning sigh as a hot, slow, steady stream began to flow from him, splashing over Yazoo's belly and chest.

Yazoo shuddered, goosebumps rising on his skin at the contrast between that steaming urine and the freezing porcelain. The rivulets that trailed their way down his chest and belly to his aching groin only made it that much sweeter, and he arched his back, sliding up in the tub for that stream to rain down on his throbbing cock.

Reno groaned above him, hot eyes fastened on Yazoo's cock, his piss coming more forcefully as he relaxed. When Yazoo started slowly, fluidly rocking his hips beneath the force of Reno's stream, the man brokenly whispered, "Oh my _god_. This is _way_ better than doin' it to a chick!"

Yazoo smirked up at him and cautiously shifted, rearing up carefully in the slippery tub, his smirk deepening when Reno first looked confused and then downright panicked.

"Yo, what're you doing—"

Yazoo grinned at him, and then ducked into the hollow of his body, slipping his hands up Reno's thighs to grip his hips, letting that hot urine pour over his throat and then his chin as his tongue darted out to caress the swollen, sensitive head of Reno's cock. He didn't care that it got in his mouth, it had happened before—he cared more about Reno's violent groan and the sudden, convulsive jerk of his lean hips. He pushed Reno's hand away, forcing his lean lover's stiff cock down, and sucked on his head to the chorus of Reno's disbelieving, encouraging gasps.

Both things couldn't happen at once—the urine died down to a trickle and then to nothing at all beneath Yazoo's working lips. He didn't go for the full-on blow-job, just contented himself with feasting on Reno's engorged, pulsing head, his free hand sliding up his lean thigh to cup and roll his balls.

It was sensory overload for the man who'd taken such relish in the sight of Yazoo writhing beneath his piss—he gripped Yazoo's hair with his free hand and urged him all the way down, hips sliding forward to press his belly briefly to Yazoo's lips.

"Holy _fuck_, baby, you know just what to do," Reno panted, biting his lip as Yazoo gracefully complied with his less-than-gentle urging. He moaned, feeling it near, but he wanted more than just Yazoo's skillful mouth—he wanted to feel that taut, slender body around him, wanted to hold him tight and pound him through a mattress as if he could prove the strength of his love through sheer force.

Fumbling for the knobs, he got the shower started, yelping when the cold water hit his bent back, which sheltered Yazoo from the freezing stream. It warmed up and Reno straightened, urging Yazoo to his feet, whispering and promising and cursing all at once.

Yazoo understood his urgency, and the pair rinsed off even while they lapped at each others lips and ran hard, hungry hands over each others bodies.

They never made it to the bed.

They got as far as the carpet and wound up in a knot of writhing flesh on the floor, Reno far too enticed by Yazoo's round backside to wait any longer. He got him on elbows and knees and mounted him with force enough to drive him to the ground, his cock rubbing almost painfully against his dropped towel. Yazoo lay there with his legs spread wide and his hips pressed to the floor, his arms braced as Reno plunged so deep—and he'd never felt anything so right. It was exquisite pain, it was awe at Reno's strength when the man hauled him up onto his knees and pulled him backwards, opening him more fully for that hot, pulsing cock. It was rivers of pleasure rippling out through his whole body and an orgasm that came spontaneously the moment Reno grasped his straining cock, startling Yazoo with its force. He didn't even have time to grab the towel to catch it—his cum shot up and out to lace the gray carpeting even as his slender body shuddered with the amazing climax.

It was all Reno needed to throw his hips up hard and gush violently inside of Yazoo, harshly groaning and shuddering at how amazing it felt. So amazing that as it faded Reno begged in a frantic, panicked whisper, "Don't move don't move don't move don't—"

Yazoo smirked.

"Hmph." He rocked his hips back hard against his lean lover and forced him into that aching dry-cum he so loved to hate, grinning as Reno's body shuddered convulsively behind him and the man called him everything from an angel to a whore, and a very, _very_ good girlfriend.

They slumped together on the floor, catching their breath, Reno curling around Yazoo and nuzzling into the sensitive skin of his throat.

"Maniac," he murmured.

"Likewise," Yazoo laughed, feeling sated and tranquil and absolutely loved.

After a moment, Reno drowsily picked himself up and pulled Yazoo to his feet, leading him to the made-up bed and sheepishly saying, "I haven't really been sleeping, yo. Just couldn't seem to be able to, you know?"

Yazoo gave him a soft smile and slid gracefully under the crisp, clean sheets, Reno slipping in beside him and half-lying on him, his sharp face tucked into the crook of Yazoo's neck.

Exhausted himself, Yazoo slowly began to drift off, laughing a little when Reno drowsily reminded him, "Don't think I forgot about the handcuffs, lady. You and me got a rain-check, yo."

"I certainly hope so," Yazoo purred, stroking his long, lean back.

"Do you love me, baby?"

"Of course I do," Yazoo said, grinning, and affectionately added, "Idiot."

When Reno chuckled against his skin and tightened his hold, as if afraid he would suddenly disappear, Yazoo knew he was finally home.

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**Okay, so this will continue, I've already started another story called, SINS—feel free to check it out if you're like me and just don't want to give this story up.**


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